Always and Forever
by politicalgirl19
Summary: This is the story about Dwayne LaFontant and Gladys Sharp starting their life together. Written by me and edited by starwars4life.
1. Chapter 1

**Well fella, this is my first Over the Hedge story. I always love it when Dwayne and Gladys are partners romantically :D I get all excited for them lol. Plus, I know Gladys seems mean in the movie but she's my favorite character and so is Dwayne. :)**

 **I also like to thank to** starwars4life **for helping me edit. I really appreciate it. ;)**

* * *

As Dwayne sat in his jail cell, he had his head prompted onto his hand with his arm resting on his leg. He had been there for a year since the Depelter Turbo and it's not the greatest experience. He always have to ask the guard to eat, using the restroom, and watching TV whenever he had the option. It really bugged him because he missed all the freedom… and Gladys.

Just then, the cell door opened, revealing the middle aged police officer about 6'2 tall.

 **Police Officer:** "Okay, LaFontant. You're free to go."

Dwayne was confused. He wasn't scheduled to get out until next year. The officer must have noticed because he said, "Some lady named Gladys came to free ya. Maybe some love purpose or something."

The last one came out as a joke, but Dwayne was genuinely surprised. He had not expected Gladys, of all people, to bail him out, much less the fact that he had a little crush on her the first time he saw her after being paged for animal problem.

Dwayne had liked that she was wearing all black, similarly to how he was wearing all orange that day. Her hair was also not too short but not too long—just the way he prefers women's hair to be. And unlike most of his previous customers, she was strong-willed enough to call him out on being late and falling behind in his job to verminate animals before he had even began. He liked people who had a no-time-for-nonsense attitude like that. On top it all, she was the most beautiful independent woman he had ever seen. She is perfect in every way in Dwayne's eyes.

But Dwayne wanted to know now more than ever what she thought about him. And there was only one way to find out.

After the officer sent him to the front office, he saw Gladys standing there with a smile on her face. He had not realized how beautiful she is. Dwayne smiled back.

 **Gladys:** "I came to get you out of there."

 **Dwayne (flabbergasted):** "Why?"

 **Gladys:** "Well… because I love you. I knew you had a crush on me since that day last year.

 **Dwayne:** "R-really? How'd you know?"

 **Gladys (giggles):** "Isn't it obvious? You referred me as "sister" and "Nancy" the next day. I really like how you're so passionate about your job and taking out animals."

Dwayne smiled and his cheeks became as red as a rose.

 **Dwayne:** "Th-thank you. I never thought that would make me attractive to anybody."

They walked over to Gladys' SUV where Dwayne got into the front seat and Gladys went into the driver seat. Gladys pulled away from the police station parking lot and drove down the road back to her newly built house after the animal shambled it down.

Pulling up in her driveway, she turned the keys into the ignition and pulled it out. They both got out of the car and walked to the house hand in hand, each wanting to find out more things about the other.

 **Gladys (as she took out her keys and open her door):** "So… other than being a Verminator… umm… what do you like to do?"

 **Dwayne:** "I also like teaching all about the verminating, reading the Verm-Tech equipment guide, watching sports and crime drama TV shows, and going on Twitter."

 **Gladys:** "That's good. It's nice to know that you have a life outside of your job."

They went into the house and Gladys closed the door behind her. They made themselves comfortable as Gladys put up her purse. They sat down at her couch.

 **Dwayne:** "How about you?"

 **Gladys:** "Oh, I like cleaning, doing laundry, cooking, reading detective novels, and doing my job."

 **Dwayne:** "Wow, you're more at the housewife level… except for the last part."

Gladys giggles at how Dwayne had said the words after his pause with a curious smile. She holds Dwayne's hand and kisses his cheek, making him blush a little.

 **Dwayne (stammering):** "Um, uh, what do you do in your job? How my job works is easy for anyone to figure out, but what exactly does a President of the Homeowner's Association do?"

 **Gladys:** "Well, using the El Rancho Camelot Homeowners' Charter that I wrote myself, I have to keep a close eye on all ongoings that happen in the neighborhood to ensure they follow each and every one of the 765 rules in the book, and enforce the appropriate penalty when they don't. People also must get clearance from me to hold any type of party, whether a barbecue, birthday, or holiday party. Here, read the most recent additions."

Gladys picks up a very large and heavy-looking book that shakes the whole room when she places it on the table. Dwayne stares wide-eyed. He can swear he's seen dictionaries that are smaller that Gladys's rule book.

When she opens near the back he reads the following information:

 **DO** remove all floating leaves from your pool by 8:00 PM.  
 **DON'T** allow your pool water temperature to vary from 86.8 F.  
 **DO** make sure your grass is exactly 2 inches tall. 2.5 inches is not acceptable.  
 **DO** make sure you're that your garbage cans are placed 3.4 feet from the curb.  
 **DON'T** put out your garbage until 7:00 AM.  
 **DON'T** forget the Homeowners Association (HOA) President's decision is final!

 **Gladys:** "Well, what do you think? Pretty nifty, aren't I?"

When Dwayne looks back at her, his face and voice show not one shred of respect.

 **Dwayne:** "So you're basically an absolute by-the-book, rule-enforcing tyrant who gets onto anyone for even the tiniest slip-up of failing to follow your rules..."

 **Gladys: (noticing the look on his face):** "I know how this looks, and yes, I can be a real stickler for following procedures. But I'm an interesting person to get to know whenever I'm not on the job. Just give me a chance to prove it to you."

 **Dwayne:** "Well…"

 **Gladys (clasps her hands together):** "Please…"

 **Dwayne:** "…Alright."

 **Gladys (smiles in relief):** "You won't regret it, I swear. Now, today's Wednesday, and the best time for me to spend an evening out with you is going to be this Saturday. 6 PM to 10PM maximum. What are your hours?"  
 **  
Dwayne (grinning):** "One of the best things about my job is that I'm my own boss and make my own hours. So if 6 to 10 is good for you, then it's good for me."

 **Gladys:** "Then Saturday it is."

* * *

 **(Squeal) They scheduled a date! I love them! What do you think? Reviews are always appreciated :D**


	2. Chapter 2

**Date time! I am having so much fun writing this and editing with** starwars4life **! Enjoy!**

* * *

-Saturday-

On the date, Gladys and Dwayne went out to dinner to a Italian Steakhouse middle-class restaurant, only 10 minutes from Gladys' house.

Gladys finds it a bit strange seeing Dwayne in a tuxedo instead of his usual orange jumpsuit, but she can't deny that he looks so… fine. The blackness really highlights the physical traits that Gladys finds attractive about him, such as the jacket, pants, and black shoes.

Gladys is wearing a navy blue jacket, white button-down shirt, and red pants, red lipstick, dark blue eyeliner, light-pink blush, and mascara that's so dark-blue it almost looks black. Lastly, she wears silver-plated ball earrings that dangle half a centimeter below her earlobes, and a silver necklace.

As soon as he came to pick Gladys up at her house, Dwayne was instantly mesmerized at Gladys's choice of attire. Now in the restaurant, her clothes seem to stand out even more, and bring out her attractive features to the optimum effect. He loves how her makeup matches the style of her outfit. She looks so beautiful.

True, part of this might be because of the restaurant's atmosphere of low-intensity lights, grey and black furniture, and wooden floor. But no, he thinks it's all her. He thought she was attractive enough in her all black outfit, but the woman before him could win the Mrs. Universe Pageant 10 years in a row… in his book at least, but his opinion about the woman he's considering to start a relationship with is all that matters right now.

Having just ordered the special of the day; the traditional ceasar for Gladys and calamari marinara for Dwayne, and knowing that it will take a while for the food to arrive, the two decide it's a perfect time to get to know each other better.

 **Dwayne:** "So, lady's first, tell me about your early life."

 **Gladys:** "Well, I come from a wealthy family. My great-grandparents, who were my age during the 1920s, were successful business entrepreneurs, and my grandfather was one of the main people who proposed the idea that families should move to the suburbs in the 1940s, which led to the famous 'White flight' of the '50s and '60s. My mom is a business attorney, and my dad is the chairman of a small but profitable construction company."

 **Dwayne** : "So that's what inspired to get into real estate?"

 **Gladys:** "Actually no, I owe that to my brothers Hal and Jay. Hal is my younger brother and Jay is my older brother. They both works for management and marketing. Anyway, I wanted to be a doctor ever since my grandmother died of cancer when I was five, but Hal discouraged me from that vocation when he dismembered my dolls and challenged me to," (impression of a young boy) " 'Save your patient,  Dr. Gladys,' "(normal voice tone) "which I could never do because the little weasel broke the dolls and pulled off the parts that I taped together. And he of course rubbed it in by saying" (impression of a young boy) " 'If this was real, your patients would be better off going straight to the hospital morgue than seeing you.' (normal voice tone) That really hurt my self-esteem…"

 **Dwayne:** "I can relate…"

 **Gladys:** "But one day when my parents were running errands, I got back at him by stealing all the money in his piggy bank and wouldn't give it back until after I gave him a sloppy makeover. (Sighs in bliss) I did  everything: lipstick, mascara, nail paint, blush, facial cream, and curling his eyelashes."

 **Dwayne:** "Ha-ha! Now  that's what I call payback!"

 **Gladys:** "Yeah. My parents really let me have it when they came back home that day, but my older brother didn't pick on me when it came to jobs that I wanted to do until I was in high school. But you know what's ironic, I actually needed someone who would be critical of the jobs I wanted while growing up, because my parents never did that to me."

 **Dwayne (confused):** "Wait, I'm not following you."

 **Gladys:** "What I'm saying is that because my family had the finances for me and my brothers to pursue any career of our choice, my parents encouraged me to become whatever I wanted. They didn't even mind if I didn't want to follow in their footsteps, which is nothing like most people I know."

 **Dwayne:** "How's that bad? I'd love to have had parents like yours. Folks who wouldn't tell you what kind of person you have to grow up into, and who wouldn't oppose you every step of the way on becoming who  you want to be. But I'll get to that later, continue with your story."

 **Gladys:** "It's bad because they never taught me how to be mindful about the things I do best, or how to stick on the path or paths that fostered this. From middle school to high school, I tried every elective you can think of: cheerleading, soccer, softball, volleyball, basketball, bowling team, tennis, home ed, physics club, engineering club, chess club, math club, debate club, band, choir, dance, color guard, art class, and SGA. Can you imagine how heartbreaking it was for me to put all of my mind and body, all of my best effort, into flourishing at everything I tried to do, only to be cut from the squad during tryouts, and cause the teams I got into to lose big games or prevent them from reaching higher-accolade events? Or how about being told by my teachers or coaches that I'm not good enough to be in the elective, and making a fool of myself during auditions where I realized the hard way just how bad I sounded or performed? Not to mention the pain of receiving low grades, attending parent-teacher conferences with my academic advisor about dropping one course for another, my parents telling me how disappointed in me they were, and the frustration of being stuck in an unenjoyable environment.

"If my parents had told me what I should do that was best for me, instead of letting me unwittingly set myself up for failure, I would've been spared so much pain. Fortunately, my other brother Jay told me to do something that changed my life forever. He suggested that I make a list of all the things I had tried, cross out the ones I wasn't good at, and only focus on the ones that I was better at which were art, home ed, and SGA."

Dwayne nods in understanding how a person would need to have drawing talents to make house blueprints, knowledge of household appliances, and leadership skills in some kind of organization or agency to eventually become President of the Homeowners Association.

 **Gladys:** "That's one of the reasons why I'm so strict, because my parents were so gosh darn lenient that they didn't give me a dose of reality before I tried something I couldn't hope to succeed in. The other reason is that like any kid, I had my share of arguments with my parents and brothers growing up, but it only helped me understand the importance of listening to authority figures. More than anything, it made me want to  be an authority figure, so that I would be the one that others have to listen to. But a pet peeve of mine was whenever authority figures were all bark and no bite; when they were all talk, but never backed up their words with actions. So starting my sophomore year at high school, I became what you'd call the 'popular kid'; the girl who everyone wanted to be and who everyone listened to… a girl who was in charge of setting the standards for all to follow."

 **Dwayne:** "Did you date a lot? That  is what popular kids do, after all."

 **Gladys:** "Of course. I had about 12 boyfriends, four in middle school, and eight in high school."

 **Dwayne:** "12…? Now that's impressive."

 **Gladys:** "Unfortunately none of them could meet my high standards of organization, prominence, or devotion to work and personal image, so I broke up with them."

 **Dwayne (raising an eyebrow and talking in an amused tone):** "Oh, really? You sure you're not forgetting  something?"

Gladys noticed the twinkle in Dwayne's eye as he spoke. There can only be one reason for that: she's been able to convince him to like her despite—she dare says because of her authoritative demeanor. She doesn't have to worry about being someone she's not to be accepted by him. So when responds with honesty, it's like the heavy load that's prevented her from having a relationship deeper than friendship that she's been carrying around her entire life since middle school has finally been lifted from her life.

 **Gladys (sighs but has a smile on her face):** "And yes, I was a 'Miss Bossy-Britches' who wanted everything to be my way or the highway. Boys had a crush on me because they thought I was hot, but they also knew I was like a control freak."

 **Dwayne:** "Ha! I knew it."

 **Gladys (looking deeply into Dwayne's eyes):** "But you're different. You're the first man to accept me for being bossy, and I can't thank you enough for that."

 **Dwayne:** "Well, now that I know the reasons for that, I gotta hand it to ya Gladys, you really  are an interesting person. You've experienced failure several times, but made a complete 180, and taken charge of your life for yourself. You are so beautiful by enduring all of that."

 **Gladys (blushing):** "Thank you. But enough about me, let me hear about your life."

 **Dwayne:** "I came from an average family, and am an only child. My dad was a former animal control officer who's now a bartender, and my mom works in a car factory. My favorite show while growing up was Star Trek, which made me want to become an astronaut."

 **Gladys:** "You'd be surprised how many people say the same thing after watching science fiction shows and movies."

 **Dwayne:** "But as I said earlier, my parents weren't like yours. They always said they knew what was best for me ever since the cradle, and wanted me to become a lawyer. Every time I told them that I wanted to be something different, they went to the greatest lengths to scold me while discouraging my hopes and dreams.

"When I wanted to become an astronaut, they said 'Being an astronaut requires you to be very smart, but you'll never come close to that if you keep filling your mind with silly ideas that you see on TV. And because astronauts aren't important for our nation's growth, they don't get paid very much and neither will you. Not to mention it's dangerous, and you'll have to go through physical training that you'd fail as soon as the interviewers at NASA take one look at your chubby body.' Heck, they shamelessly used the Challenger Disaster of 1986 to gloat at how right they were and how wrong I was. My parents' insults aside, the Challenger did scare me out of wanting to become an astronaut, but I still didn't want to become a boring lawyer. From fourth grade to my freshman year at high school, I wanted to be a novelist, movie actor, director, or theater performer. But all they told me was, 'You'll never be good enough for any of that. Think realistically, son, those careers will either make you or break you; and most of the time it breaks people who then wind up on the streets with no job. And even if you did make it—which you wouldn't—you wouldn't get famous overnight. You'd only get stuck in B-movies, children's theater plays, or tabloid magazines because you don't have any creative talent.'"

 **Gladys (sympathetic):** "I can't believe they would say those things to you, their own son."

 **Dwayne:** "Yeah… And even before I started taking out my emotions with eating, I was always the 'fat kid' who wasn't good at any physical activities—even playing tag—and stayed inside reading comics, watching TV, and playing video games. I was always the first choice for my school peers to pick on. So without anyone to support my aspirations, and with lots of bullying issues, I had pretty low self-esteem for my whole life before college.

"And throughout that time, my teachers were no different from my parents. They told me that I should only read books that could 'take me somewhere in life' instead of reading about the stuff I actually enjoyed. And you know what's funny?"

Gladys has been listening to Dwayne's story which she has found as compelling as it is depressing. She's full of so much sympathy for someone who's had such as rough life on all fronts, that she feels obligated to let him continue and to respond to all of his prompts. As she does the latter, it's in a voice full of earnest.

 **Gladys:** "What?"

 **Dwayne:** "One of my college roommates, who was majoring in education, said that forcing kids to read things they're not interested in is actually bad for intellectual development because it makes them hate reading and thus school. But if a kid  does read what he's interested in, he'll develop of love reading which leads to a love for learning. And a love for learning leads to a smart individual. I still read things that interested me despite what my teachers recommended. My parents, teachers, and classmates laughed at me back then, but now I'm the one who's going places, I'm the one who's making a name for myself. They're all stuck with their same old rudimentary jobs with terrible conscience they'll gonna live with. My experiences with people always wanting to control my life convinced me to never be like that, and to become a person who does what's best for myself."

 **Gladys:** "Congratulations… I mean it. You stuck to what you believed in the most and followed through with it even when everyone was trying to bring you down. Any weaker person would have given up on life, but you didn't. That's actually fascinating, no, awe-inspiring. Your story could make great a novel, TV special, or movie. And I'm so sorry to hear that you had unpleasant times with your parents and peers. All my life, I always lived in a really nice neighborhood. To be honest, I liked it so much that I wanted to be in charge of my own, which is why I started studying to receive my business degree with a focus in real estate at Butler University."

Dwayne is impressed at Gladys's success in college which has enabled her to make good salary by working independently at a big, attractive neighborhood with nice people. He would have said this out loud if she didn't speak before he could.

 **Gladys:** "Did anything good ever happen to you back then?"

 **Dwayne:** "Well, whenever my peers had trouble beating video games I'd be the man who knew what to do. So it was good being better than everyone else at something, and for them to come to me for help. But I was usually the outcast in middle and high school who always wanted to be with the popular kids, but they never let me hang out with them no matter how hard I tried."

 **Gladys:** "So I guess you rarely had any girlfriends?"

 **Dwayne:** "I had only one during high school and she was just as much an under-achiever and social outcast as I was. But our relationship ended the night I took her to my first and only prom when I was a junior. When jazz music started playing, we began to get wild with our dance moves and I thought, 'Hey, how about I snazzle and dazzle everyone with a crazy dance move?' I ended up tearing my hamstrings and breaking my back…" (sigh) "My old jazz dance injury…

"Since then, I have been too shy to date any else out of risk embarrassing myself."

 **Gladys:** "Did you at least impress everyone?"

 **Dwayne:** "Only a few. Most were laughing their heads off. But after that night, I started working more often by briskly walking in my neighborhood every day after school so my weight wouldn't end up killing me. I lost 85 pounds by high school graduation, and kept going on walks around the Verm-Tech campus every other day."

 **Gladys:** "Well good for you."

 **Dwayne:** "Thanks."

The two turn their heads once they see the waiter bring their food and they start eating. They take four large bites out of their plates before something comes to Gladys's mind.

 **Gladys:** "You still haven't told me why you wanted to become a verminator."

 **Dwayne:** "Oh, yeah. Remember when I told you about my dad being an animal control officer?"

 **Gladys:** "Uh-huh."

 **Dwayne:** "When I was a high school freshman, he lost his foot from a wolf attack which forced him to become a bartender."

 **Gladys (shocked):** "Oh my…"

 **Dwayne:** "And despite our differences, I still loved my dad enough to decide I should find some way to avenge his loss. That way was becoming a verminator at Verm-Tech Institute."

 **Gladys:** "I see. So you're still on good terms with your parents?"

 **Dwayne:** "Yep. But what about you? What made you hate animals?"

 **Gladys:** "My mom's pride and joy was her vegetable garden that she had growing in our backyard, but it was always getting looted by rabbits, raccoons, squirrels, and other vermin animals. I can't tell you how many times we had to buy and plant stuff to replace what was lost, only to lose it again and repeat the cycle. And then one day we were working on re-planting when my mom went to go get some yard tools in our garage, leaving me alone to place the plants where she wanted them to go. Several raccoons, rabbits, possums, and weasels came out of nowhere to eat the new veggies, and when I tried to shoo them away, they pounced onto me and started biting or scratching me all over. My mom drove them away with a shovel, but I was roughed up badly and needed twelve stitches and a lot of shots to get better… and I absolutely  hate needles."

 **Dwayne (grimaces):** "Ouch…"

 **Gladys:** "Yeah…But at least nothing like that has happened to me twice."

Dwayne nods and the two resume eating. After dinner, they check their watches and see that they still have plenty of time to go see the movie, Juno. They both talked about what they liked or disliked as they walk out of the theater and when they finish the conversation, that's when Gladys will become distraught with how it's 10:20 PM.

Gladys looks at her watch and notices it's 10:20 PM.

 **Gladys:** "Oh my gosh, it's 10:20!"

 **Dwayne (casually looks at his watch):** "Yep."

 **Gladys:** "It's way past my normal bed time. That means I've only got eight hours of sleep instead of nine hours. I gotta brush my teeth, wash my face, select the coffee I'll want in the morning—"

 **Dwayne:** "You still have plenty of time to do that, don't get so mad."

 **Gladys:** "NO! I  have to keep to my schedule, and because we sat through that movie, now I'm gonna have to make up for it!"

 **Dwayne:** "Well, did you have a good time tonight?"

 **Gladys:** "I… yes…"

 **Dwayne:** "If you're so obsessed with keeping a schedule when you're having leisure time, then something's wrong with you."

Gladys suddenly feels like she's finally found the answer to all of her life's problems: she needs to be more flexible and live life to its fullest, instead of being a slave to a strict schedule. That's what made her the unlikable "Miss Bossy" that the people at El Rancho Camelot whisper about.

 **Gladys:** "You're… absolutely right… The first step to become a likable person is to become more lenient in my routine."

 **Dwayne:** "That's the spirit."

 **Gladys (wraps her arms around Dwayne):** "Thank you so much, Dwayne. You've turned my whole life around!"

 **Dwayne (a bit confused, not knowing how to properly react):** "Um, my pleasure, Gladys. That's what friends do for each other."

Gladys smiled and kissed his cheek and Dwayne blushed slightly. He was getting used to Gladys' pecks. In fact, they hadn't actually kissed on the lips because they wanted to take it slow. After all, they didn't really know each other that well on the first day they had met. But the next morning when they got arrested, they had felt like they knew each other a bit more, but not that much. Dwayne had still thought she was beautiful, even when she was bald. She had basically been the same person.

During Gladys' time in prison, she couldn't stop thinking about Dwayne. After she had absorbed the fact that he liked her, she took a look at Dwayne's job and was impressed how he could identify any vermin just by sniffing.

They went back to Dwayne's car after a 10 minute drive, he dropped her off at her house. Exchanging byes and how they'll see the other tomorrow, he drove back to his apartment complex.

He couldn't wait to see how the new and improved Gladys Sharp will turn out… and neither could Gladys.

* * *

 **Aw, they've been through a lot, facing conflicts! But those lovebirds came a long way! 3 If you like it, just let me know in the review!**


	3. Chapter 3

**I am really sorry for the really long wait! We both had been busy with some stuff! I ended up getting sick over Christmas break for seven days and getting caught on with school and homewworks and stuff. But I am passing all of my classes! Yay!**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

On Monday morning, Gladys woke up in her room and look at the time. It was 6:30 A.M. Usually she wakes up at 6:00 A.M. She panicked at first but she remembered what Dwayne told her last night. She smiled at the thought. Having such strict rules can cause problems.

Getting up, she slipped on a pair of her bunny slippers and groggily went downstairs, barely awake.

Yawning, she filled her coffee in her cup and went back upstairs to get dressed, sipping her coffee. As she went, she was feeling more awake.

Setting down the coffee at her tableside in her room, she went to her wide closet and took out her usual outfit of the day; a maroon shirt, a black dress jacket, a pair of black dress pants and her high heeled black leather shoe.

After getting dressed, she made her bed. She left the house and locked the door. Walking toward her black Navigator, she opened the driver side door and hopped in.

Driving to work, she pulled up at her office and left the car.

Walking into the building, she went into her office and starts arranging for a meeting to change the rules, following Dwayne's advice. She scheduled it for 11:30am, giving her all the time she needs to edit her rules. Dwayne advised her to not be so obsessed with the strict rule and removed any rules that doesn't seem important.

11:30am came just as she was perfectly prepared and she called all of her co-workers to meet up at a big room with a long table. Everyone started walking into the room, not really looking forward to hear what's on Gladys' mind. But all of that changed when they saw a smile on her face. Not a rude one or anything like that, but the one that they see whenever someone is happy or proud. They knew something is going on according to that alone.

 **Gladys:** "Have a seat, everyone."

They all did as they were told and sat down, prepping themselves. Gladys started speaking.

 **Gladys:** "Hello, everyone. I gathered you all here today because I decided to change the rules."

Everyone was surprised by her sudden change in her pride. They thought she was going to get more hostile when they assumed that she'll change the rules.

 **Janis:** "Why are you doing this? We've

been operating under your rule book for a few years now. We've memorized everything in it. But now you want to change it?"

 **Debbie:** "And the rules are accepted as sound, if not a little excessive, on the Homeowners Association's local, state, and national level policy.

 **Gladys:** "Well, to sum it all up in a nutshell, I met someone who taught me the importance of being more flexible when it comes to my daily schedule, and I intend to apply the same flexibility to my profession."

The workers thought about it, exchanging some conversations. After a few moments, they turned to Gladys. Another worker agrees.

 **Worker:** "I believe that is right. Whoever that person is had never been more accurate."

 **Gladys:** (smiling): I agree.

After the meeting was over, Gladys went back to her office. She thought about calling Dwayne, but she decides not to, in case he's out on the field and was busy. She decides to wait until 5:00pm when she gets off.

Upon reflection, she is happy with herself for becoming more lenient. It was a bit challenging at first, but she knew it's what Dwayne would have wanted for her… what the residents of El Rancho Camelot would want from her. She believed they and her fellow colleagues will appreciate her more now with some additional leeway in their lives. After all, everyone makes mistakes and forgets things every now and then, even when following the HOA's procedures, so there shouldn't be any strict punishments for being human.

At 5:00pm, she called Dwayne and told him she wanted him to come by her house at 6:30 or 7:00—whatever time would best fit his schedule rather than her schedule. He decided he will come over at 6:30, so that he will have more time to spend with her. As Gladys drove back to her house, she felt the heavy weight lift off her shoulder after getting over her obsessive behavior with her routine. It's like everything in her life is going better than usual.

She gets to her house, and just as she set down her briefcase on the kitchen table, she hears a knock on her front door. She instantly knew that it's Dwayne. Walking to the door, she opened it to reveal him, just as she predicted.

 **Gladys (smiling):** "Hi, come in."

 **Dwayne:** "My pleasure."

Gladys shuts the door behind him.

 **Gladys:** "You're here earlier than I expected."

 **Dwayne:** "Well, I was in the neighborhood and finished sooner than I thought. It turns out that the people who thought they had a wild animal living in their attic didn't have any vermin problem at all. It wasn't vermin fur they found in the insulation, but the fur of their pet dog who followed them into their attic when they brought things up there to store in the space."

Gladys gives a nod in affirmation and interest at the job her lover came back from. They sat on the couch together and Gladys spoke up.

 **Gladys:** "You'll be happy to hear this. Today at work, I prepared myself to arrange a meeting where I edited my rules to an appropriate amount and I told my staff that I met someone who taught me the importance of being more flexible when it comes to my daily schedule, and I intend to apply the same flexibility to my profession."

Dwayne smiled and pulled her into a hug.

 **Dwayne:** "I'm so proud of you."

 **Gladys (returning the gesture):** "Thank you!"

 **Gladys:** "Hey, I was just thinking. You speak Spanish well, right?"

 **Dwayne:** "Yes, my level of the language is excellent."

 **Gladys:** "Yeah, I can see that you said some Spanish words that week when I phoned you over here last year."

 **Dwayne:** "Yeah, I learned Spanish when I was in middle and high school."

 **Gladys (smiling):** "That's good."

 **Dwayne:** "Do you know any certain languages?"

Gladys shook her head 'no'.

 **Dwayne:** "You want to?"

She shook her head 'yes'.

 **Dwayne:** Okay. _Eres tan hermosa._ Translation: you are so beautiful.

Gladys blushed a deep shade of red as Dwayne kissed her cheek.

 **Dwayne:** "So, have you been able to throw your annual Welcome to the Neighborhood Party?"

 **Gladys:** "I haven't have the chance to, thanks to those vermin. But now that you mentioned it, I think I should throw it. It  is one of the rules of the Homeowners Association, after all. And I won't let a group of animals dictate whether I throw the party or not."

 **Dwayne:** "That's the spirit, even though they've lived here for a year they won't be foolish enough to try anything with so many people. That reminds me, have they been causing any trouble for the neighborhood lately?"

 **Gladys:** "No, they hadn't."

He nodded and Gladys continued.

 **Gladys:** "I will schedule it, and I'm more than happy to invite you."

 **Dwayne (smiling):** "Thank you."

As the two continue talking, as they walk down the sidewalk, they failed to notice the red squirrel on the tree branch hovering above them.

Behind the hedge RJ the raccoon, Verne the turtle, Stella the skunk, Ozzie and Heather the opossums, Lou, Penny, Bucky, Quillo, and Spike the porcupines, and Tiger the Persian cat are lingering around the forest and hanging out. Since the Depeltor Turbo incident, they had not been heisting at the neighborhood. They had been living off the nuts Hammy had found at the end of the first week of spring last year.

 **Verne:** "How long has it been since Hammy went to find his nut stash that he hid in the suburbs?"

 **Heather:** "About five minutes."

 **Verne:** "Ok, then something's wrong. He said he was just going to check on  one tree and then come right back, which is why I didn't ask anyone to keep an eye on him. Now we need to go find him."

 **RJ:** "Relax, Verne, I'm sure he just got distracted looking at stuff. And I've taught all of you the things to watch out for in the humans' world that I know of."

 **Verne:** "But what about the things you don't know of? And don't forget this is Hammy we're talking about, all bets are off when it comes to him."

 **Stella:** "Then quit flappin' your lips and let's start doing somethin' about it."

As the sound of scampering feet and a wind gust became audible, the animals knew Hammy was approaching. The wind in his wake still managed to ruffle everyone's fur despite their preparation for it. Hammy wasted no time in talking after coming to a stop.

 **Hammy:** "Hi everyone! Sorry I was late—"

 **Verne:** "Where have you been? We were starting to get worried about you."

 **RJ:** "Actually, only you were worried. I told you to relax and look what happened: everything worked out A-ok."

Verne rolled his eyes at RJ's snide tone.

 **Penny:** "He has a point there, Verne."

 **Verne:** "You too, Penny?"

 **RJ:** "Anyway, what was holding you up, Hammy?"

 **Hammy:** "A tree branch, of course."

 **RJ (sighs):** "No, I mean what took you so long to come back?"

 **Hammy:** "Oh yeah! Well, I was at the tree where one of my nut stores was stuffed in, when I heard Psycho Lady and The Sniffer talking about a party."

Everyone's ears shot up in interest and all eyes were facing the squirrel. His nicknames for Gladys and Dwayne did not come as a surprise for the group. Quite frankly, they thought it fit the two humans perfectly. What they really want to know more of was the last two words that left Hammy's mouth.

 **Bucky:** "What kind of party?"

 **Hammy:** "They said 'Welcome to the Neighborhood Party.' Or maybe it was 'We'll come to the Jaeger Hood Party, like Robin Hood except Jaeger. OR, maybe they said—"

 **Ozzie:** "Speak no more, Hammy. I remember Gladys, erm, Psycho Lady saying something about a 'Welcome to the Neighborhood Party' when I gave my greatest performance ever last year."

 **Quillo:** "But what does it mean?"

 **Verne:** "It means lots of humans are going to come into the suburbs, so we better not—"

 **RJ:** "—What it  means is that we'll get so much food, it's gonna make the amount we got last spring look like a peanut. We are talking food up the wall of the Burj Khalifa being brought into our midst!"

 **Spike:** "What's the Burj Khalifa?"

 **Tiger:** "It the tallest building in the world: 828 meters."

Everyone lets out a "Huh?" in confusion.

 **Tiger:** "That's 2,717 feet."

They not only understood what Tiger was saying now, they started yelling in excitement… except for Verne who has to raise his voice to get their attention.

 **Verne:** "Hold on, people! If that's the case, then that means there's gonna be humans galore. There's no way we'll be able to steal food from them without being caught. And if Gladys and the Verminator are gonna be there, then they'll be looking for us to get revenge."

 **RJ:** "You don't know if any of that is really true… At least not yet."

 **Verne:** "And  you don't know if everything I've said is not true."

 **RJ:** "You're right, but we still don't know just yet."

 **Hammy:** "I'm so confused…"

 **Lou:** "Yeah, start making sense."

RJ saw the others give him blank stares, the kind of look that indicated elaboration is needed.

 **RJ:** "All we have to work off of is Hammy's testimony that Gladys and Dwayne are here, and that a Welcome to the Neighborhood Party is going to take place. We need to start eavesdropping and spying on the humans, particularly the ones in charge of the party, so we'll know just how many people are coming and what they'll have set up. When we have this Intel, then we can decide how to pull the raid off without risk of getting caught… or verminated."

At the mention of verminated, Ozzie played possum.

 **Verne:** "And if it turns out to be too risky…?"

 **RJ:** "We'll still do a heist, but not get food up the wall of the Burj Khalifa."

 **Quillo:** "No way! We need to get the mother load!"

 **Stella:** "I'm with the kid, we can't let an opportunity like this pass up on us!"

 **Penny:** "Jeepers, we could get enough to feed us for two years!"

 **Lou:** "What's your tail say, Verne?"

His excitement of the others—and even himself (secretly)—convinced him to at least see where RJ's plan will go.

 **Verne:** "So who's going to do what in your little plan, RJ?"

RJ smiles and tells the animal family what to do and how to do it. It seems that everyone is excited for the Welcome to the Neighborhood Party… Humans and animals alike.

* * *

 **Again I am sorry for the really long wait! D: I hope this long chapter made up for it! :D**


	4. Chapter 4

**Sorry for the long update,starwars44life was pretty busy and so was I in preparation for the upcoming school year which starts on Monday for me. According to starwars4life, it's the best chapter we had ever done. Basically, it all started with me all like, "Hmm, how about I should write this chapter about the 'Welcome to the Neighborhood Party'. Thought that would be pretty cool. Enjoy!**

* * *

Less than a week later, the day of the Welcome to the Neighborhood Party had come. The suburbs looked more like a town fair than a neighborhood. In addition to having lots of food tables and vendor stations, there are inflatable slides and moonwalks, an inflatable caterpillar tunnel, cornhole boards, fire pits for making s'mores and/or roasting marshmallows, ring tossing booths, a dunking booth, a mind winder, a trackless train ride, spider climb & slide, reckless ride station, a bull ride machine, a 50 foot wall climbing post, and a small swing ride. All of these were set up in the street and certain yards, with the total spacing taking up about four streets.

At the party, Dwayne showed up wearing his verminator clothes instead of casual wear, which makes people think he's really out of place. Even Gladys said to him that she wanted him to come as a party patron, not to be on the job. During the party, Dwayne initially be more focused on trying to sniff out and locate the animals instead of enjoying the atmosphere.

 **Dwayne:** "Something tells me that those vermin will be around here somewhere."

But Gladys and some of her favored residents—people who are just as by-the-book as she once was before Dwayne taught her the importance of being flexible—dissuaded him from doing so. Really, it's a 'Welcome to the Neighborhood Party', it meant to be filled with fun and laughter. It's more like an orientation, just a bunch of family eating food and playing games. It's an irresistible opportunity for the community.

 **Person 1:** "There are way too many people around. Those vermin you're so paranoid about won't risk getting caught."

 **Person 2:** "Yeah, and the noise we're all making should be more than enough to frighten them off."

 **Dwayne:** "Not these vermin. Tell them Gladys."

 **Gladys (putting her hand on his shoulder):** "Just relax, and have a good time."

Dwayne thought for a moment, then realized that Gladys was right. He decided to trust what the people were saying about the unlikeliness of the animals showing up, let loose, and have some fun.

Dwayne went to a food booth when Gladys engaged in more conversations with other residents. Continuing to take his mind off his job, he went to a ring toss booth, lost at that, but then won at a cornhole game. His talent in the latter came from his earlier days while at Verm-Tech.

* * *

At 1:30PM Gladys was standing by a house driveway. She had a good time talking to some new residents and old acquaintances, and was looking forward to finally having a little fun herself. The only thing left for her to do was to go onto a set-up stage to make a few announcements. As Gladys walked to the set-up stage, she had no idea of the trouble that awaits her as she gets behind the stage's podium.

From a few houses down past the fair-like add-ons and where the suburbs still looks like suburbs, the hedge animal family sat in anticipation as RJ looked at the party through his binoculars.

 **RJ:** "Alright, Gladys is going onstage. Since people will be paying attention to her, they won't notice us heisting for food."

The others got into their wagon-load-heist positions and move unnoticed into the suburbs.

However, it is not the hedgies that Gladys will have to watch out for. But rather members of her own species.

 **Gladys:** "May I have your attention please!"

The partygoers quickly stopped what they were doing and looked at the stage… their actions clearly displayed before the hedgies. As Gladys continues her speech, the animals gathered around in a huddle after seeing RJ give them hand signals to do that.

* * *

 **Gladys:** "That's better. First off I, Gladys Sharp, President of the Homeowners Association, would like to thank each and every one of you for coming to the second annual El Rancho Camelot Estates 'Welcome to the Neighborhood Party.' As all of you know, El Rancho Camelot was founded two years ago to provide people with their very own 'gateway to the good life.' I intend to make good on that slogan by continuing to be more lenient in my rules for the suburbs. And after talking to the El Rancho Camelot's financial committee, I'm happy to announce that this year's party has already exceeded our intended revenue five points above the mark. What that means is, with your continued patronage and diligence in following our suburban community's rules, the Homeowners' Association vows to reward its residents with plans to build two public swimming pools, and five cul-de-sac –sized neighborhood parks. These will have plenty of space for playgrounds, public grilling areas, picnic tables, and outdoor fireplaces for all residents to enjoy."

Everyone in the audience cheered loudly, and were so interested in what Gladys will say next that they continue to not notice the hedgies bring back their first wagon load of food to the hedge.

Once the crowd quieted down Gladys took a breath to speak, but was suddenly interrupted.

 **Male voice:** "But is it worth the cost of murder?"

Everyone's attention shifted to the direction of the voice that just spoke.

There were five people; four men and a woman dressed in nice suits. But their most prominent physical feature was looking at Gladys with a stern expressions on their faces.

 **Gladys:** "I beg your pardon, Mr…?"

 **Michael Eads:** Michael Eads, leader of the Wildlife Protection and Humane Treatment Association's Indiana Branch. And my associates and I find it distressing how you're throwing a party celebrating the murder of hundreds of North American wildlife that inhabited the woods that were destroyed to build this community. In addition, this area was one of this state's 10 remaining woodlands that had been untouched by humans since the end of the Holocene Epoch that locked all seven continents to their current position on the globe 10,000 years ago."

 **Note: The Wildlife Protection and Humane Treatment Association (WPHTA) is a fictional animal rights advocate group.**

 **Ryleigh Sumida:** "If you had done your research Ms. Sharp, you would have known that these former woods, and the creatures inhabiting it, had the Earth-given right of protection from real estate development."

 **Gladys:** "I have to admit that you just provided me with some very intriguing information. However, the Homeowners Association was given permission by the state and federal government to develop these lands for human residence."

* * *

 **Tiger:** "The humans are  really distracted now."

 **Verne:** "I guess we won't be needing to plan to distract them, which can save us a lot of hassle."

 **RJ:** "Good point, Verne-o."

 **Bucky:** "We should go ahead and start looting again!"

 **Quillo:** "But we should wait until more humans are distracted."

The hedgies paid attention to the humans as more of the latter were paying attention to Gladys onstage and a minute later, they all agreed to resume heisting, but proceed quietly and stealthily.

* * *

 **Gladys:** "And as any citizen in global society knows, the state's and country's population is increasing, so more housing space is needed."

 **Michael:** "Can't argue with that, but you could have built only a few tall condos to leave more space for animals and the environment. But no-oh, you plowed through 54 acres of wilderness, killing countless flora and fauna."

Gladys muses in sarcasm, "Oh, great. One of these people again..." then responds, recalling her reasoning she had used so often in the past that she's memorized it.

 **Gladys:** "Condominiums are more suited for college campuses and tourism areas, not for raising families. And condos big enough to hold the amount of people who currently live in this neighborhood would violate state and county building codes."

 **Tyler Stevning (speaking loud to get the attention of as many people as possible):** "Speaking of building, why did you have the construction companies build the suburbs during the winter when animals are hibernating? They were completely defenseless, helpless, and unable to run away! You massacred them in their sleep! What kind of monster does something like that?!"

Gladys felt the pressure rise along with her temper as several families started listening to the debate.

 **Gladys:** "I wasn't there to witness the landscaping operation—"

 **Landon Ford (rhetorically):** "Don't you mean senseless, wanton destruction?"

 **Gladys:** "—But isn't it safe to assume that all the noise woke up the hibernating animals, and they were able to run away in time? I certainly think so."

 **Wyatt Havran:** "First, if you have to assume anything that means someone's not doing their research before authorizing major decisions involving taxpayer money and resources from hard-working employees. And as for your delusion of hibernation is concerned, don't be so sure of that. Some animal species can be woken up from hibernation, but most do not."

That piece of knowledge visibly surprised listeners who proceeded to look at Gladys with stern expressions of their own. She began breathing heavily as her anger continued rising.

* * *

Now that the people have left the food booths to walk over to the commotion going onstage, this gave the animals the opportunity to seize the goods.

 **RJ:** "Alright, now that the food is unguarded, we can go back to the hedge to get more wagons to store our food and loot for more."

* * *

 **Ryleigh:** "And you said that you didn't even observe the deforestation? What kind of person in a high-order authority such as your standing talks the talk, but doesn't walk the walk?"

A few "Yeahs?" come from some of the residents who, having heard something their HOA President has done, and not done, want to get a better idea of who was running El Rancho Camelot.

 **Ryleigh:** "I'll tell ya: A spineless, lily-livered, puffed-up, snob who thinks they're too important to mingle with average people, is full of themselves, and is out of touch with the common man. You just sit in your own perfect shell of seclusion, counting your money and comfortably getting fat, while letting your puppets do all the real work for you."

Gladys amazingly kept herself from lashing out at the man and his colleagues. But it wasn't easy, because she struggled to remain calm and her face was starting to turn pink despite her makeup.

 **Gladys:** "I'm sorry, but what does this have to do with the animals you claimed that I possibly and inadvertently might have killed? And where's your evidence to support the amusing story all of you have been telling?"

 **Tyler:** "My cousin worked on the landscaping project that built this neighborhood. He saw tons of animals inhabiting this area."

 **Gladys:** "Do you hate your cousin who, according to you and your pals, must have killed the hibernating animals?"

Gladys's face cools down when the audience turned and looked at the animal rights advocate with skepticism.

 **Tyler:** "There! You just admitted that animals died from your housing project! And I don't hate my own cousin. He was just doing his job… the job that you made him do in the first place. He didn't quit because he had a family to feed, and he felt guilty for his actions of destroying animals and their dwellings. You on the other hand seem to be incapable of caring about the costs of your actions."

That was enough to reignite the flare back into Gladys. But not every listener sided with the animal rights advocates, as the next comment indicates.

 **Debbie:** "Well, I have a family to feed and raise too. And with every housing lot and apartment in the town full, I would have had to move away from all of our friends and my kids' schoolmates if it weren't for the El Rancho Camelot Estates."

Most listeners nodded or spoke a word of agreement, much to the advocates' displeasure.

 **Debbie:** "Are you saying that the well-being of my family is a crime?"

 **Male resident:** "And while it's important to treat animals humanely, even activists like yourselves can't deny that the animals' life doesn't come close in comparison to human lives."

 **Michael:** "But all life is precious. Whether it's a human being, a pet, and yes even a wild animal."

 **Different male resident (jokingly):** "Including cockroaches too, I bet."

His 11 year old daughter goes "Ewww!" and several people laughed.

 **Landon:** "We don't deny that humans must have their needs met more than animals. But we're against people who make cold, calculative decisions just to get wealthy and make a name for themselves, especially if it's paved on the lives of animals. Like your beloved Homeowners Association President did."

 **Gladys:** "I didn't do it for profit or fame, I did it because people needed homes. And the state approved, meaning most people wanted it to happen. If you have a problem with it, go complain to the governor instead of coming here to try and ruin a party meant to foster friends and fellowship."

Many residents cheered, and Gladys looked at the advocates with a smile of victory on her face.

 **Wyatt:** "Is that what you people really think of her? Yeah, this party is fun and generous, but is that how she's like on days besides this one?"

The crowd quieted down as they entered in deep thought. The advocate didn't hesitate.

 **Wyatt:** "Actions speak louder than words it seems… I've read the El Rancho Camelot rulebook, and it sounds like Ms. Gladys Sharp is quite the slave driver."

Gladys started to sweat as she pondered, "I should have become more flexible a little sooner…"

 **Janet:** "She actually altered some of her rules recently, so she's not as bad as you claim."

Gladys internally sighed in relief.

 **Tyler:** "But why not change _all_ her rules? If she really was a good person, she would have thought about what's best for her fellow residents."

At this point, Gladys was disgusted that the altercation has been going on this long. Heck, the fact that it lasted longer than one minute had already overstayed its welcome. Gladys decided to forfeit dignity and end this right here right now.

 **Gladys (insultingly):** "I'm sorry, do you believe a person of your stature can tell me how to do my job?"

Tyler smiled as the bait has been taken. Hook, line, and sinker.

 **Tyler:** " 'Your' stature? Sounds like someone has a superiority complex."

Everyone looks back at Gladys in shock. Not from her actions, but from realizing that the advocate's most recent words held undeniable truth.

 **Ryleigh:** "I  told you she's out of touch with the common man!"

 **Landon:** "She represents the one percent, the rich people who think they're so much better than the rest of us. It doesn't matter how much she eases her regulations, she'll always see people like us as lower than herself."

Gladys started walking toward the group of advocates, coming to a stop 10 feet away from them.

 **Gladys (pointing):** "That's enough! I must kindly ask all of you to stop with your bantering—it's causing a disruption—or leave."

 **Michael (snidely):** "Come and make us, broad. If you have the spine to do something on your own for a change, that is."

Gladys was so angry that she didn't even feel her leg muscles tense up in preparation to sprint toward the animal rights advocates. But she doesn't move an inch because Dwayne stood in front of her with his one hand giving a "stop" gesture to her, and the other doing the same to the group of advocates.

 **Dwayne:** "Everyone—Calm. Down. NOW!"

 **Michael (to Gladys):** "Who's this clown? You're anger management counselor, or stooge-bouncer?"

 **Dwayne:** "Wrong and wronger. I'm just an average man here to enjoy the party, which, by the way, happens only once a year, so we need to cherish every single second of it. But you're getting in the way of that—for everyone, even yourselves. If you even came here to have a good time in the first place."

Several onlookers said "Yeah" or something similar to that degree.

 **Janet (to advocates):** "And where are your manners?! You don't just call a woman 'broad' no matter if she's rich or not, you cheap low-life!"

 **Four teenage boys (to advocates):** "Party-poopers!"

Since the rest of the residents gave Michael and his friends angry looks and glares, he could see now that he and his friends have lost the battle. So he was smart enough to know when to admit defeat, and his voice reflected this.

 **Michael:** "Alright, I can tell when we're not wanted. We'll leave, for everyone's sake."

 **Dwayne:** "Apologize to her first."

 **Michael (sighs):** "Alright…" **(Looks into Gladys's eyes and speaks seriously):** "Ms. Gladys Sharp, I'm really sorry for ranting off the way I did, and for saying terrible things to you and about you."

 **Tyler:** "We all are."

The other advocates nodded and said "Yes."

 **Michael:** "It was disrespectful, immature, and uncalled for. I don't know what came over me or my colleagues. It's not my place, not any of our place, to challenge someone based only on their negatives without thinking about the positives."

 **Wyatt:** "I think all of us took our jobs too seriously today."

 **Gladys:** "I agree, because I did too."

 **Landon:** "But you did it out of self-defense. We went overboard."

 **Michael:** "You don't have to forgive us."

 **Ryleigh:** "We don't deserve it after what we said…"

 **Tyler:** "But we're truly and deeply sorry. It'll never happen again. We promise."

 **Gladys:** "I accept your apology. And I'll use what you said to me today to start making things better for everyone. And so there's no hard feelings, how about I buy all of you a drink and something to eat?—On the house."

 **Michael:** "We'd love to!"

 **Gladys:** "Follow me."

 **Note: The portrayal of the animal rights advocates in this chapter does not reflect the views and opinions held by myself or starwars4life on real-life animal rights advocates. The words and actions of the animal rights advocates in this chapter are merely a plot device to create conflict in the story.**

As Gladys led the partygoers for the food and drink tables, she and the others stopped dead in their tracks after 10 feet. Simultaneously, the 12 hedgies froze in their place 50 feet in front of Gladys's group. Everyone, human and animal, panicked.

Well, everyone except one person. And he is glad that he came dressed for such an occasion. However, Dwayne remembers how he and Gladys were not enough to prevail against these creatures. Needing to avoid a repeat of his humiliating defeat, he grabbed the microphone from the stage.

 **Dwayne:** "Calm down everyone, there's 12 of them and hundreds of us. Listen to me and we can subdue these vermin. Everyone in the area from the pizza stand toward the stage needs to rush them now. Everyone past the pizza stand needs to block their escape through the hedge behind Gladys's house and the ones next to it. Gladys, you and your close friends go to my van to get as many handheld contraptions you can carry. But  don't try to use them. Just bring them to me."

Too frenzied to give anything a second thought, the crowd obeyed each of Dwayne's three instructions and Dwayne begins running toward the animals after pulling a shock rod from his pocket.

In a frenzied state of mind himself with the humans running toward his family, Verne yelled, "AH! What do we do?!"

One of the family members responded, "Leave this to me. Ya'll just make it to the hedge before they can block it off."

The humans going after the hedgies stop dead in their tracks when Stella steps in front of the animal group.

 **Tiger:** "No, my love!"

 **Stella:** "Just GO they won't dare to get near  me."

 **Partygoers:** "Aiiieggh! SKUUUUUNK!"

 **Stella (while winking at Tiger):** "Told ya."

She turned to face the human crowd to discover that Dwayne has caught up with the group of people whom he instructed to go after the hedgies. But unlike the untrained spectators, he doesn't stop advancing.

 **Dwayne:** "All of you go after the other animals and leave the skunk to me. If worse comes to worse, a skunk needs at least 10 days to 'recharge' its spray. Once she uses it, she'll be relatively defenseless."

The partygoers can't help but feel impressed with Dwayne's bravery. Seriously, who has the guts to not only charge at a skunk, but also be willing to risk getting skunked in the process of catching it? The answer: A real man's man; the kind of man that a real man goes to for help when he isn't being man enough.

Simultaneously, Stella heard every word that comes out of Dwayne's mouth and knows this too. And since she and her family's lives were at stake, she will only use her stink as a last resort. And with escape still being a viable option, now was not the time to gas the humans.

 **Stella:** "He's right. Run!"

With that, the hedgies go to all fours and sprinted, save for Penny and Lou who, being faster than a turtle, picked up and carried Verne.

In true real man's man fashion, Dwayne leads the charge like a knight in mediaeval times with his shock rod raised high into the air as if it was a sword. Instinctively, the forest family headed toward the direction of the hedge with the intention to get through it before the humans who were told to guard it could reinforce their line of defense. But because Dwayne's instructions that split the partiers into three groups left a decent number of the animal-catchers in front of the pizza stand, the animals are already facing the threat of being cut off before they can even get within eyesight of the hedge.

RJ quickly remembered all the stands and attractions spread throughout the party area, and came up with the only plan that gives the animals a chance to escape.

 **RJ:** "Everyone scatter! Lose 'em in the rides and the booths, and then meet back at the hedge whenever and however you can. If anyone gets caught, me and whoever makes it back  will find a way to rescue you."

Of course, the raccoon understood that his plan had a big flaw: it assumed that he would not get captured. Though he had no doubts of his new family willing to go to whatever lengths were necessary to save him if he needed rescue, their capability would be drastically limited without his know-how of the human world. Not to mention even RJ wouldn't have been able to survive in the past among humans' ever-encroaching presence in nature—or in nature itself for that matter—without the items in his golf bag. Should he get captured, the time it would take for the others to figure out what items to use, and how to masterfully use them, might not be enough to save him and anyone else who was caught.

All of that passed through RJ's head in a second after he had spoken. By which time, Ozzie started to ask a question.

 **Ozzie:** "But what if you—?"

Needing to ensure doubt did not cloud the others' heads, RJ quickly interrupted the opossum before the marsupial could verbally state the weakness of the plan that Ozzie seemed to figure out.

 **RJ:** "—Split up  now!"

Obeying, the animals separate with each species going in a different direction. And so began a great chase like none ever before.

The porcupine parents continued holding onto Verne while Penny says, "Stay close to us, boys!" Bucky, Quillo, and Spike were more than willing to follow their parents' lead. And although Heather considered herself old enough to do things without her dad's help—what teenager didn't?—this situation was not the time to assert her independence, and required her to not leave Ozzie's side.

 **Heather thinking:** "I need his adult experiences to help me get through this. Besides, he'll need me to keep him from playing dead in the middle of a chase."

Unlike most creatures, opossums have a fight-or-flight-or-play-possum response imbued into their instincts. And thankfully, Ozzie knew that playing possum was the last thing he should do. His priority along with Lou's and Penny's was to do everything in his power to keep his child safe.

* * *

When the animals headed into multiple directions, the people pursuing them did the same. Hammy went to the far left parallel to the humans behind him; Stella to the far right also parallel to the humans behind her; the porcupine family and Verne kept going straight, and the possums to the right diagonal direction between Stella and the porcupines. RJ was more daring and ran to the opposite direction towards the humans chasing the hedgies. Many partiers were so surprised that they stopped, which only led to some rear-end collisions. Tiger also wanted to buy the others some time by creating mayhem for the humans and did so by climbing up on top of the human closest to him then leaping from one head to the other like a frog would on lily pads. Other people, their eyes fixated on the rest of the animals, were too late to notice the crowd in front of them and ended up running into each other head-on. But most avoided collision, and maintained their pursuit.

Dwayne reached into one of his jumpsuit pockets and handed out walkie-talkies to some of the people who had fallen on the ground before they could resume their chase. He told them what channel each device was set on, which channel he would be on, and ended by telling them to call him to ask for any advice on how to catch the animals and to inform him when any of the creatures were caught.

He then went after Stella who, being a skunk, caused any person in front of her to scramble out of her way. This, coupled with Dwayne's slow running speed, allowed her the luxury of taking her time to think about a direction in which to go without being in such a rush. With RJ's know-how making him the most important family member to avoid capture, Stella found it kind of ironic that her least-appealing trait made her the second most important animal to avoid capture. Her skunk spray was the only sure-fire way to force away the humans guarding the hedge, or to save the others if they got captured. And Stella would use it to free any family member, because they accepted her into the group after she had lost her parents when she was a teen, and despite that she was a skunk. But right now she had to focus on ditching her portly pursuer.

Stella stopped again to look around for an attraction she could use to her advantage—only for her thoughts to be interrupted by a jolt of electricity at her tail. Needing to slow the skunk down, Dwayne had taken advantage of the mustelid's hesitation to fire at it with the two taser prongs he shot out of his shock rod. The attack, though, did not have its intended effect, much to Dwayne's disappointment and Stella's fortune. The prongs only contacted the fur rather than the skin, and Stella instinctively ran forward, losing a bit of tail fur in the process but escaping unharmed with only slight burns. Dwayne temporarily lacked a weapon to catch her, but that was quickly resolved when one of the patrons following behind him ran up to hand him a t-shirt cannon.

In any case, Stella knew that she can't take her time to stop, think, and then choose a direction to go. Now she simply ran, and not a moment too soon, because Dwayne's first t-shirt landed inches from the spot where she would have been standing. In her haste, the skunk ran toward the first ride her eyes came across: the inflatable caterpillar tunnel. She dove through the entrance gap, expecting the blow-up contraption to give her a shortcut to the opposite side, only to discover that the interior was like an obstacle course. There were cylindrical pillars coming from below, the sides, and the roof. Because navigating through those would take time that she didn't have, she turned to leave out the way she came in, but Dwayne then entered the caterpillar at that moment. His body language showed caution—no doubt preferring that he didn't do anything to make the skunk spray him—but there was a sneering grin on his face that showed confidence.

With no other choices, Stella tried to go through the first pillar located on the floor, but it was too stiff for her to push out of the way to proceed.

 **Dwayne (while reaching for Stella):** "I've got you now!"

Stella bit his hand, causing him to reel back in pain, then bit the inflatable pillar which popped like a balloon and cleared her a path to the next pillar that she couldn't slip past. She bit that one too, and soon found herself free from the first pillars. Being a fully grown (and not the fittest) man trying to navigate a ride designed for small children, Dwayne had to uncomfortably crawl after her which slowed his progress despite being able to easily pass through the inflatable pillars. Stella had no trouble going past the pillars on the sides and ceiling due to her short size, then scurried up the trapezoid-shaped hill using the hand/leg holes, and went down the slide at the top. She actually had a bit of fun and would have liked to enjoy herself more, but knew that now was not the time.

She was nearing the end of the tunnel when she faced her final, and greatest, obstacle: a steep triangular-shaped hill without hand/foot holes to scale. She tried going up it only to lose her grip and slide down to her starting point. She glanced back and saw Dwayne wasn't as close as she had feared, but was gaining nonetheless. She tried to climb the slick slope again, this time more frantically, but her padded feet slipped just as they did the first time.

 **Dwayne:** "You're not getting away  this time."

Stella turned to see Dwayne nearly upon her, this time wearing thick rubber gloves that will protect him from her teeth or claws. When Dwayne raised his leg to take another step forward Stella instinctively raised her tail at him, and the verminator instinctively became flustered. He lost his concentration which made him lose his balance and fall forward. Stella was just as surprised by the man's folly; so surprised that she didn't have time to use her spray, only time to get out of the man's way. While he was sprawled on the slope, Stella climbed on Dwayne to get over the slope and slide down the other end.

With a grin of satisfaction, Stella exited through the hole in front of her—

—Only to get tangled in the t-shirt that was fired at her from the shirt cannon by a middle-aged man who had been waiting for her to emerge out the other end of the inflatable caterpillar tunnel. By the time she overcame her shock and started to struggle for a way out of the shirt, Dwayne came to pick her up and started to tie the shirt in a knot.

Stella knew this was it for her. Using her spray would be a waste because none of it would hit Dwayne, only the shirt. But only she could understand what was said next.

 **Voice:** "In the name of my ancestors, I will free my beloved—Or die honorably while trying!"

Dwayne turned to the sound of a screaming Rrr-yeeeea-owwww!

and got a face full of cat fur when Tiger jumped onto the verminator's head. Dwayne dropped the shirt and the man who had used the shirt cannon on Stella came over to help him on reflex. The Persian cat quickly got on top of Dwayne's head and yanked off his toupee, but was grabbed by the shirt-cannon wielder. Tiger tried to claw that guy, but the latter threw the cat forward.

 **Middle-aged man (to Dwayne):** "You okay?"

 **Dwayne:** "I'm fine, just catch the skunk."

The man nodded and picked up the shirt, only to feel that the weight of the cloth had decreased by one skunk for Tiger had bought the Stella the time to escape.

 **Middle-aged man:** "The skunk's gone!"

Dwayne tried to find anything with black fur and white stripes, but couldn't. However, a nearby spectator's convenient cry of "SKUNK!" pointed Dwayne and his posse in the correct direction.

* * *

After separating from the rest of the family, RJ, being a healthy raccoon in his physical prime, interchanged between running under and jumping over tables full of food and merchandise. His pursuers were still too frantic and acted on instinct rather than careful planning. The result was the humans getting either a face full of food and merch, or bumping into the metal braces below the tables. RJ was already in the process of jumping on top of the next and final table, when a human woman who had been waiting there ever since noticing the raccoon's table stunt, flipped said table over. RJ lost his balance and fell face-first to the ground. He could have quickly recovered and ran, but decided to surprise the woman approaching him. When the opportunity was right, RJ leapt at the woman while hissing with his claws sticking outward. The woman instinctively backed off to avoid getting clawed or bitten, and RJ continued to run when his feet touched the ground.

After looking around while not straying from his running path, he located the area that had the inflatable slides. One of his talents as a raccoon was his ability to make detailed and fully thought-out decisions quickly. Hence, what would normally require another animal to have to stop when the coast was clear and think things out, RJ did that as he ran. He decided to repeat his lunges at any human who got in his path to make them back off as he headed toward the inflatable slides because they did not have Verm-Tech training like Dwayne. From the slides he could get an idea of where the rest of the family was, the status of the people who were assigned to block off the hedge, and think of a way to get behind it. In the time it took all of that to pass through his head, he had only traveled eight feet since landing. He altered his path as if he had intended to go to the slides all along.

 **RJ thinking:** "I just hope the others can think almost as fast as I can…"

Since worrying any longer would break his concentration, RJ stuck to his plan and arrived at the inflatable slides. The slides were colored red, blue, yellow, and white, and there were two types of slides to choose from. The first was a little kiddie slide with a height of six feet, a slight incline, and had a small moonwalk attached to the slide on the left. The other one was 40 feet tall, and had a slide on the left and right with the sloped staircase to the top located in between the two slides.

Needing to cause more disorder as a means to distract the people chasing him, RJ headed for the kiddie slide where there was a girl toddler playing in the moonwalk offshoot. The girl's parents saw RJ coming their way and moved to stop him from reaching the moonwalk via the net guard opening—just as RJ wanted them to. He jumped to the far right, landed on the slide, climbed the incline that was so minor the raccoon swore that he has climbed hills steeper than the slide, and then leaped into the moonwalk from the unguarded top. The girl screamed when a wild animal landed on her which made her fall to the floor where she bounced a little, but otherwise stayed put. Her scream made the group of people chasing RJ come to the girl's aid, even though an adult could only enter through the small net guard opening one at a time. Her mother was the first to get through and because her attention focused on reaching her daughter instead of catching the raccoon, RJ had the time to bounce three times so that he reached the height necessary to clear over the moonwalk's open top and onto the top of the slide where no other human was waiting.

The people soon corrected that error, but RJ was already running toward the larger slide which would soon be on his left. The only two people on it were supervisors at the top on the left and right slide whose job was to ensure only one person went down at a time. Knowing that the mob after him would be waiting at the bottom of the slide(s) if he climbed up, RJ intended to only hop across the guard rails at the bottom to give the humans the impression that he was dumb enough to trap himself.

But when a different group of people suddenly appeared in front of him and to his right, RJ realized that some of the partiers were able to overcome their panic and think of a way to outsmart him. Even so, he was a raccoon and his life as a loner gave him the skills to get himself out of trouble using actions in addition to words. Hence, he knew what to do by the time he reached the bottom of the middle staircase.

He glanced over his shoulder to confirm that people were following close behind him, climbed the stairs a little, and looked back again to see several people coming up the stairs after him and even more gathering at the bottom of the two tall slides.

 **RJ thinking:** "That's it. That's it. Keep comin' for me."

When he was three feet from the top, he can see the two supervisors already moving to intercept him. Judging the time to be right, he leaped onto the staircase's guard rail to the left, jumped on top of the sun guard overhanging the top of the slide, then turned to face the opposite direction toward the bewildered humans. He accomplished the feat thanks to his species' ability to turn their hind paws 180 degrees, which enabled him to climb things at an angle that most other animal could not.

Still facing the direction he had come from, he gripped the slide with all four paws to slow his decent down the vertical-angled wall at the back of the slide. His claws made some minor incisions on the way down, but not enough to deflate the slide. No, for that he ran over to the slide's air pump when his feet touched the ground. He turned it off, and the slide, along with everyone still all on it, started rapidly sinking to the ground. The humans' weight only expedited the process and buried most of them under a wall of thick rubber in a matter of seconds.

 **RJ:** "Ha! Suckers!"

He didn't take long to gloat and resumed his run toward the direction of the hedge, hoping to come across a few family members on the way.

* * *

After separating, Ozzie and Heather immediately came across the ride that they would use to get away from the group of people chasing them: the spider climb & slide. The attraction looked like a regular inflatable slide, except the only way to get to the top was by climbing up the 24 foot tall meshed tower using the trampoline-like fabric in the center that resembled a plaid shirt. The ride was occupied by some kids who had been on it when Dwayne rallied the people to chase the animals. Despite this, Ozzie believed this made the ride perfect for him and his daughter to climb.

 **Ozzie:** "Let's go this way, Heather."

 **Heather (while pointing):** "But there are humans still on it."

 **Ozzie:** "They're just kids, so they won't be strong enough to harm us, and they might be scared of us if we surprise them.

Heather nodded as she got her dad's point. Apparently he knew there was a different way to use his species' drama besides playing possum. In addition she noticed that the attraction had six levels to climb through the trampoline fabric, each one too short for any adults to scale fast enough to catch them.

The marsupials entered the meshed tower at the bottom and started to climb to the next level. Just as they had hoped, their sudden appearance caused one of the humans to yelp, "Aiegh! Giant white rats!"

Ozzie and Heather rolled their eyes at yet another creature that confused the opossum species with a rodent, which they found almost as annoying as Verne did at being mistaken for an amphibian. But at least their plan to startle the kids worked…on the first level of the spider climb. Once the two possums reached the second level, however, one of the four kids in it, reacting to the first kid's yelp, smiled and said, "Cool! Let's pet 'em while our parents aren't around to stop us!"

Figuring they wouldn't get any other chances to hold and carry what they believed were large white rats, the kids stopped climbing and moved to get their hands on the possums, the latters' eyes widening in fear as a result. Ozzie and Heather picked up the pace after hearing the kids' intention, but the marsupials weren't fast enough to avoid the kids. Heather half expected her dad to play possum, but right now he was too afraid for his daughter to do that.

However, his fear was not rooted in any harm that the humans will do to either of them, but rather what his daughter will try to do to the humans. He knew that Heather preferred to take action rather than playing possum, which had its benefits as well as its downsides. And with his daughter starting to tense up in defense, Ozzie spoke quickly.

 **Ozzie:** "Heather,  don't bite or scratch them! No matter what they do to us."

 **Heather (with her teen attitude spiking from her dad's pacifism):** "For real, dad?! We've got to—"

 **Ozzie:** "The moment we become hostile, the kids will try to attack us too!"

Much to Ozzie's relief, Heather face showed that she understood. Her eyes quickly glanced at the adult humans gathering around the spider climb & slide like a swarm of angry bees. That was bad enough. But as she imagined what it would be like for that to happen in the climbing section, she realized that her dad knew of other ways to play possum as well. Namely, to let events play out, and then act when the time was right.

* * *

Meanwhile, the porcupine family had a decisive advantage from the rest of the animals in that their sharp quills prevented humans from grabbing them from behind. But there were still humans pursuing them from behind in order to keep the pressure up for Lou and his family. Not to mention there was always the chance that someone could come in from the side to snatch up Bucky, Quillo, and Spike from their unprotected bellies. Lou and Penny turned to look over their shoulders for the fifteenth time and saw their sons starting to fall behind.

 **Lou:** "Don't slow down, kids!"

 **Quillo:** "We're trying not to, but Spike almost tripped and we had to pull him back on his feet."

 **Spike:** "We've never had to run this hard and fast before."

 **Bucky:** "I told you we should've had a caffeine drink for breakfast!"

The situation didn't bode well for Penny and Lou. Even though the porcupine sons are energetic boys, the three's stubby legs prevented them from making as much progress as their parents. In order to carry their sons, the couple would have to put down Verne who was naturally slow.

 **Penny:** "Verne, we need to carry our kids—"

 **Verne:** "I know. Just get me to the nearest ride you come across, it doesn't matter which one."

After some quick surveying, Lou and Penny saw that they were approaching the mindwinder.

 **Lou:** "Hold onto your shell, Verne!"

With that, the two threw Verne as hard as they could toward the direction of the attraction. The turtle would have to hoof it for nine feet, but at least they had given him a head start. Lou and Penny then slowed down so that their sons came running past them. They then hopped into their parents' arms and the porcupines kept running. When some humans blocked off their forward path, the prickly rodents were forced to stop and turn right. When they did, a teenage boy that was behind them dove forward and ahead of the porcupines to grab them from the side. He wore a visor-equipped football helmet that he had returned home to pick up, which provided him protection from the quills. Unfortunately, he dove too far and his chest landed past the rodents who were able to walk run over the teen's legs and continued running toward the reckless ride station a few more yards in front of them.

Then all five porcupines suddenly found themselves airborne when a different teenager swatted at them with a lacrosse stick. The unexpectedness caused Lou and Penny to lose grip on their kids, who land on a whack-a-mole game.

There was already a boy toddler at the active station with the mallet in his hand. His father had told him to stay at the whack-a-mole game while the older man went out to help catch the animals. With his limited knowledge of mammals coupled with the desire to win a prize, the kid tried to hit the young porcupines indiscriminately from the fake moles that pop out of the holes.

The kid aimed for Spike first who rolled out of the way, but was jutted into the air by one of the mechanical moles that popped up. Fortunately the human boy had lost interest in Spike when a different mechanical mole pops up and he hit that. Then he went for Quillo who ran across the length of the whack-a-mole station while keeping away from the holes where moles would come out. The mallet hit a mechanical mole in front of Quillo which caused the young rodent to run into it. The kid prepared to hit the downed Quillo, when Bucky was flung upward by a mechanical mole located below the human's elbow. The young porcupine arched his back and stuck the human with his quills.

Unsurprisingly, the human kid's arm reeled back and he dropped the mallet.

 **Human kid:** "OW! Daaaaaaaddyyyyyyyy!"

The machine ended its game cycle as the human ran to his father a few booths away, leaving the porcupine triplets time to catch their breath.

 **Bucky:** "I gotta admit, that was kind of a thrill!"

 **Quillo:** "For  you. That kid nearly hit me!"

 **Spike:** "Hey, our parents are over there!"

The other two looked where their brother is pointing to see their parents running for them—while under hot pursuit from humans.

 **Penny:** "Jump into our arms, kids!"

Bucky, Quillo, and Spike timed their jumps and landed into their parents' arms without a problem. The only problem now was the humans chasing them.

 **Penny:** "We've spent enough time on the open ground. We need to find a ride, lose the humans, and head home."

Despite the danger they were facing, the triplets got excited about going on a ride.

 **Bucky:** "Sweet! Let's go to the swing things!"

 **Spike:** "No, the slides!"

 **Quillo:** "No the—"

 **Lou:** "Now's not the time to choose, boys. We're going to the first one we see."

 **Bucky, Quillo, and Spike in unison (disappointed):** "Yes, daddy."

Needing a clearer view, Lou and Penny ran into the open street away from all the tables and located the swing-like reckless ride: a contraption with an overhanging circular passenger holder that could seat 12 people in a circle that spins and swings back and forth between two A-frames.

 **Lou:** "We have a winner."

 **Penny:** "But how will we turn it on?"

Lou is at a loss of words when he noticed that there weren't any humans around the ride to activate it, what with them trying to catch him and his family. But all doubt cleared from his head when Bucky speaks up.

 **Bucky:** "Throw me onto the control panel. I can activate it."

 **Spike:** "Yeah. Quillo and I can just run to the ride from here."

 **Bucky:** "And give me one of your quills, mom."

Not questioning his son for a second, Lou had Bucky stand on his paws while ignoring the quills on his son's back that poked into Lou's belly fur. When Spike gets on the ground, he plucked out a quill from Penny and handed it to his brother. Lou then launched Bucky into the air when he was near the control panel.

Bucky quickly pressed the Start button and then, using his technological knowledge he obtained from videogames and TV, tweaked the system so that the ride would spin faster and swing higher. He assessed where the wires connecting the Stop button would be, then drove his mother's quill into the spot with all of his strength. As indicated by the sparks and smoke that came from the Stop button, his aim was dead-center and would prevent any people from turning the ride off. He then jumped down and entered the passenger holder with his parents and siblings.

Too focused on catching the porcupines to notice what Bucky did to the control panel, four humans got into the passenger holder and tried to grab the rodents. The people instantly fell down when machine started spinning. They tried to stand back up, but only managed to rise into a crouch when they were flung to the right as the reckless ride began swaying like a pendulum. After that, the humans were only able to put their arms on the floor when they were swung to the left. In contrast, the porcupine family sat safely in seats with the seatbelts strapped tight, and even Lou and Penny start enjoying the ride along with their sons.

 **Penny:** "Jeepers, this is pretty fun!"

The humans screamed "AH!" as their bodies are shoved to the side.

 **Lou:** "You said it, hon."

The humans groaned as they strained to hold on to the spinning ride's railing.

 **Spike:** "It's a good thing you chose this one, dad."

The humans yelled, "OH!" as they were shoved to the other side.

 **Quillo:** "I already think it's the bestest one at the party."

No longer concerned about catching the porcupines, all the humans focused on holding on for dear life! What's worse was that the ride was now going too fast for anyone else to get on it to save the four people.

 **Human woman:** "Someone stop this crazy thing!"

 **Human kid:** "Get me off of this! I'm only eight and wanna live to at least 10!"

A man on the ground went to the control panel and pressed the Stop button, but it had no effect. He frantically tapped it rapidly, then tried holding it down until the ride stopped, and then tried holding it down for three seconds before releasing it—every attempt failing to do anything. He instinctively shared the grim news, much to the horrified trapped riders' dismay.

 **Man at the control panel:** "The Stop button is broken! I can't shut it down!"

The porcupines continued their calm conversation while all heck broke loose for the humans.

 **Lou:** "That reminds me, we need to think of a way to get off this ride ourselves when the time comes. I'm already getting a bit dizzy."

 **Teenage girl:** "My grip is slipping!"

 **Bucky:** "I'm not dizzy. I can go five minutes on this thing!"

The teenage girl screamed as she lost her grip and is flung into the air. Expecting the worst, she yells her last request.

 **Teenage girl:** "Tell my boyfriend that I love him!"

She then landed on top of a table with a large cake, which broke her fall but caused the dessert to spew in all directions. Many people are hit by cake and others slipped on the ground when they ran over the spots some of it landed.

 **Penny:** "Even so, we're leaving as soon as the last human gets flung off. No arguments. Survival first, thrills second."

Bucky, Quillo and Spike understood that their mother was right, and responded, "Yes ma'am."

The eight year old boy was the next person to fall off the reckless ride. He was caught by his pudgy mom, but the speed of his landing into her caused her to fall backwards and onto a table with buckets of chicken wings which are sent flying into the air.

One of the buckets remained upright and didn't spill any wings—but the college-age young man on the reckless ride found himself wishing the wings did when the bucket landed on his head. He lost his hold and was tossed out of the ride on its next upward swing, landing on the ground near the reckless ride's A-frame. After raising his head, his eyes were immediately drawn to the large and thick cable powering the amusement ride.

 **Lou:** "It won't be much longer now, kids. So get ready to unbuckle and wait for my signal to jump off the ride."

The triplets nodded and kept their attention on the woman who was barely clinging to the ride. At the same time, the college-age guy reached up for the cable, but could only do it slowly since he was still disoriented from his head injury. The woman was then tossed from the ride and landed on top of an unsuspecting spectator.

 **Lou:** "Okey-dokey, unbuckle your seatbelts now!"

The porcupines undid their restraints just as the college-age guy yanked the cord out of the ride's outlet, causing the reckless ride to suddenly and immediately stop. The porcupines were caught completely by surprise and flew forward, all hitting their head on the metal bars which knocked them out cold.

* * *

Tiger had the best advantage out of all the hedgies, because he was a Persian cat and not a wild animal. Therefore, there wasn't a single human trying to catch him. However, he understood that he had to put himself in harm's way to assist his new family and friends at escaping. Even though his parents were bred in America, they had raised him and his other siblings in the culture of the region that spawned their species. Since ancient times, Persian cats have been the guardians of their home and loved ones, no matter how rich or poor those might be. Though he was taught to live as pompously and prideful as possible, Tiger was also willing to fight to keep what he valued safe.

At first his loyalties lied with his former owner, Gladys Sharp, who gave him everything he could ever ask for. It was a glorious life, but deep down he felt like something had been missing. He wanted to branch outside his comfort zone, to do something out of the ordinary, to take life by the haunches, and above all else, to find someone to fall in love with. The animals who he has been with for the past year have let him finally feel true and full satisfaction in life. In other words, they gave him everything Gladys Sharp couldn't. This was especially true about Stella, whose appearance was beautiful and her will was strong. Such were the qualities that defined his proud and noble species during their historical heydays, and Tiger felt he could restore that state of yore for his family's name only with Stella and the others. And unlike his parents, the forest animals accepted creatures into their family no matter the species. Those were more than enough reasons for him to do what he could to stop their capture and possible termination.

Having just saved his lover, Stella, Tiger jumped on top of a vendor tent to get a better view of where the rest of the family was. He could see the opossums, Ozzie and Heather, going up the spider climb & slide. Unlike the rest of the partiers, these kids didn't want to catch the marsupials out of ill intent, but out of fascination instead.

Even so, the children's actions were delaying the opossums, which gave the adults chasing them on the ground more time to surround the bottom of the attraction to cut off any escape. Tiger made his way over to the spider climb & slide, then stopped when the crowd around the attraction was too big for him to distract by jumping onto them.

He needed to make a bigger distraction, but didn't know how…until his eyes came across a vacant fire pit. The humans who had been using it had abandoned the s'mores-making area once they were told to start chasing the animals, but their marshmallows and roasting sticks were sitting by idly, propped up on nearby chairs.

Tiger hurried over to one of the roasting sticks, grabbed it in his mouth, and put the marshmallow at the tip into the fire pit. Once it was on fire, Tiger made his way to the crowd at the spider climb & slide. Some were wearing shorts, but a good number had on pants. No matter what attire they were wearing, all the humans were too busy looking at the possums to notice the cat as he used the burning marshmallow to discretely light several peoples' pant legs.

A man next to one of such unfortunate candidates in Tiger's distraction plan smelled something funny.

 **Man (to the person next to him):** "Hey? Do you smell something burning?"

The other man sniffs, turned his attention to the source of the smell, and freaked out at seeing flames going up his right pant leg.

 **Man with the burning pant leg:** "AH! I'm on fire! I'M ON FIIIIIIIRRRRREEEEE!"

That outburst proved to be the first domino in the stack, because immediately after he spoke, the other humans who Tiger had used the burning marshmallow on rapidly noticed and screamed when they noticed they had been lit on fire too. The mention of fire, coupled with the panic causing the victims to temporarily forget they needed to roll on the ground, distracted the kids in the spider climb & slide away from the possums.

Ozzie and Heather took full advantage of the ruse Tiger created and climbed up to the top where the woman supervising the slide section of the attraction noticed two possums coming toward her.

 **Female slide supervisor:** "Wha—?" (Carefully reaching out to grab the possums) "Easy there little critters…"

Heather looked at Ozzie who nodded, causing his daughter to smile. When the human's fingers were close, Heather hisses and bites. The woman got her hand out of the way just in time, but reeled back in self-defense. That gave the possums the window they needed to run past her and go down the slide.

Ozzie's nervousness in going down the steep slope was apparent as he yelled "Whooooaaaahhhhh!" all the way to the ground. Heather on the other hand had a blast as he raised her arms in the air while yelling "Yahooooo!" The anxiety and fun lasted until they got back on the ground and started running again.

There was no fear of being pursued for the moment since the humans were still trying to put out the fires, so Ozzie led Heather in the direction that would take them back to the hedge. They made some good ground before having to hide behind an unoccupied ring tossing booth in order to let some people trying to catch Hammy pass by them. None of them saw the marsupials, but Ozzie realized that he and his daughter had to try something different to avoid capture.

 **Heather thinking:** "I wish I could run as fast as Hammy right now…" (Out loud) "The coast is clear. Let's go, dad."

 **Ozzie (grabs Heather by the shoulders):** "No! That's what they want us to do. If we try to run we'll attract their attention and they'll catch us."

 **Heather:** "But if we stay here too long they'll catch us too!"

Another small group of people came running past the booth, but again doesn't see the opossums. Heather, realizing from the humans that just passed them that she and her dad would have been in serious trouble if they had been running when she had urged to, suddenly became more willing to consider alternate solutions. Ozzie's heart seemed to smile upon seeing Heather's facial expression go through such a transformation. Though his daughter could be headstrong from time to time, her intellectual gaze as she gets ready to ask him a question assured Ozzie that his wife's intellect had in fact been passed down to Heather.

 **Heather:** "How do we, like, stop playing their game?"

As the two looked around to get an idea to outsmart the humans, Heather looked to her left and noticed that the ring toss booth's entrance door was slightly ajar, providing them a perfect hiding spot. At the same time Ozzie looked up and saw what would be the key to their victory.

Heather opened the door, slipped through, and held it open as Ozzie came in with her.

 **Heather:** "We can lay low here until things calm down."

 **Ozzie:** "Yes, but once things do settle this ring toss will be back in business. The person running this is probably trying to catch the others, but when he comes back there won't be enough room in here for us to avoid the human stepping on us."

 **Heather:** "So what do we do now?" (In sarcastic humor) "Play possum?"

 **Ozzie (smiles at Heather and points upward):** "Exactly!"

Heather looked up, saw that the prizes for winning the ring toss were stuffed animals, and mirrored her father's smile when she looks back at him.

 **Heather:** "I get it!"

After using their acute hearing to determine when there weren't any humans around the ring toss booth, Ozzie and Heather started climbing to the shelf with the animal plushes.

 **Ozzie:** "Remember to keep your eyes open if any people look at us, don't blink."

 **Heather (nods):** "Right."

They reached a spot that each of them could lie down, and kept still as they blended in with their surroundings like a chameleon. The thought of that reptile made them ponder, if all possums could do this type of defensive behavior, a different animals would have to be chosen to fill the phrase "playing possum." But then again, anything besides "possum" wouldn't sound as good.

* * *

Elsewhere, Hammy's speed and small size made him all but uncatchable by any humans who were able to see him long enough to chase him. But he quickly outran or disappeared from such humans, taking much pride in his talent.

 **Hammy thinking:** "Ha-ha! No one can catch me. I'm too fast! Do not underestimate the 'Hamsquad' as RJ calls me. Hm, I wonder how he and the rest of the family are doing right now? Should I try to go find them? Nah, I gotta get back to the log and then wait for the others to come join me like RJ said."

His decision was made. And since he's always good at keeping a positive attitude and outlook, the thought that everyone else could be captured never crossed his mind.

 **Hammy thinking:** "There's just one thing I need to know: which way is the log?"

Hammy stopped as it dawned on him that he doesn't know his way around the suburbs as well as RJ does. Whenever he and the others went on heists—including today—he always followed RJ's lead, or followed the ones following RJ. On his own, he had little sense of direction. He also didn't get a chance to explore the El Rancho Camelot Estates with the others this past year because they didn't go on heists while living off his nut supplies. Not to mention the neighborhood party's setup made the already unfamiliar layout of the suburbs all the more confusing.

He would have thought longer, but when the corner of his eye glimpsed a human reaching to grab him, Hammy immediately stopped thinking and proceeds to do what he does best: just do things. And right now he needed to run.

 **Hammy:** "Quick decision!"

He zoomed away from the human who grabbed nothing but air, and went on his fast trek. Shortly judging himself to be at a safe distance from any people, Hammy stopped again to think—aloud.

 **Hammy:** "Which way do I go? Left, right, forward? I need to find the Steve the Hedge. Where is he? Urgh, why do I have to be so short?! If was taller I could see Steve, but if I was taller I wouldn't be as fast and nimble as I am."

The American red squirrel ran some more to avoid a group of humans who just noticed him and gave chase. Once he quickly outran them, Hammy stopped again when he suddenly knew what he had to do…

 **Hammy:** "I need to make myself get taller, just for a bit, by climbing into a tree!"

He spotted a tree and climbed to the top. But there is a frown rather than a smile on Hammy's face when he discovered that the tree is too short to locate Steve the Hedge. He couldn't even see past the house of the yard the tree was located in.

 **Hammy:** "I gotta get even taller. But how?"

As fate would have it, his short attention span that normally distracted him from doing tasks was what gets him out of his pickle. He diverted his thoughts on how to solve his dilemma when his ears picked up the sound of a human cheering his sister as she scaled a 50 foot rectangular climbing wall.

 **Hammy (smiles):** "Just what I need!"

As Hammy zoomed toward the attraction, a lightning bug arrived to flash above his head, but all that was left of the squirrel by the time the insect arrived at the tree was the wind Hammy created when running away.

 **Lighting bug (disappointed at failing to do his nature-given job):** "Ah, phooey!"

* * *

Once he landed on the ground, Verne quickly made his way to towards the mindwinder: a ride with eight passenger buckets that carried two people, were spaced apart from one another, and connected to the triangle-shaped central pillar by steel bars that overhang which were designed to spin patrons in a circle. In addition, the buckets had a dial in the middle that passengers could turn to make their bucket spin fast.

The ride was still in operation at the time Dwayne rallied the people to chase the animals, and continued to spin its patrons around as Verne approached it. The turtle wasn't used to running like the mammals in his family were, but he gave it his best because the family needed his wisdom to make it through life. Not to mention someone who could keep RJ's carelessness in check. Luckily there weren't any people on the opposite side of the mindwinder, so Verne would be able to get a good distance ahead of his pursuers by running thorough the diameter of the passenger buckets' spin cycle. The humans after him weren't as short as the reptile, so they would have to circle around the mindwinder in order to continue pursuing him.

Even though Verne was thankful that his short height would prevent him from getting hit by any passing buckets, he was still worried to death about the others. If RJ got captured, the rescue is all over. He's the one with the brains for that kind of shenanigans.

But if even one of the family members gets capture, it would all be over, period, for Verne. He loved each person in his family as if they were his own children. They were the best thing that ever happened to him in his life. It's often said that everyone has two best days of their lives. The first best thing is the day they are born into this world. The second best thing is when they discovered what they were put on this earth for in the first place…When they discover their reason for living. Verne had spent 35 of his 60 year-old life trying to find out what his reason for living truly was. He had tried living as long as he could with his parents and siblings, only to lose them when they were sucked into a dam, never to be seen again; had tried making friends with other box turtles only to be rejected; had climbed a mountain to find a rare flower that could cure his mate of her illness, only to return too late to save her; had tried to raise his biological children into responsible and mature individuals, only for them to be rebellious teens who would rather live on their own without following their father's rules all the time; had tried to remarry to start a renewed life, only to be incapable of finding a mate who would truly love him for who he is—all of which contributed to create his overly cautious nature.

Then he met his hedge-family who needed a sound leader to guide them somewhere safe and prosperous, and to keep them in such a utopic state of being. That was when Verne had discovered that his reason for living was not to be the head of a family with his own species, but with a group of varying mammal species. He and they quickly learned to love each other, became inseparable, and then turned into a true family.

He had lost so much in life that his heart couldn't bear losing anything else that he held dear. He then decided not to worry about the others and trust that no matter what happens to him or anyone else, they would still be a family…a whole family. He would make sure of that. He had to. Such a motivation reinvigorated the turtle as he entered the mindwinder's passenger bucket diameter.

Just as his spirits were lifted up, Verne yelps when he himself got lifted up when the tip of the dial-spinner that protrudes out the bottom of one of the passenger buckets snagged the part of his shell at the back of his neck. He flailed wildly, afraid that he would smack into another passing bucket, and landed instead in the next passenger bucket. The two 11-year old boys never noticed the reptile land in the bucket's floorboard because they were too focused on looking at each other and maintained that focus. Before entering, each of the two kids had made a bet that he, and not the other friend, would not get sick from turning the dial rapidly. In an effort to win the bet, both kids spin the dial as fast as they could.

Verne tried to stand but quickly fell back down, this time on his back and at the very angle that prevented him from getting up without another's assistance. There were now three things spinning: the mindwinder itself, the passenger bucket, and Verne on his shell. By the time the mindwinder made the bucket rotate 360 degrees, Verne suddenly believed that smacking into a passenger bucket would have been better than landing in one unharmed.

The two boys only spin their bucket faster and faster, each starting to feel slightly queasy, but neither one willing to lose the bet. Verne on the other hand was reaching his limit, as indicated when he raised his voice to address the kids.

 **Verne (yelling):** "Stop—Spinning—Already! You—Thrill—Seeking—BRATS!"

Of course, it was a worthless effort since the humans couldn't understand Verne, but he was desperate and out of any other options.

Soon it didn't matter, because the two boys looked down when they smelled something bad coming from somewhere near their feet. They yelled in shock when they saw Verne in the floorboard of the bucket lying next to a pile of vomit. One of the kids reached down, grabbed the turtle, and threw him out. Verne stayed in his shell to protect himself, but his hopes of experiencing a dizzy-free landing were shattered when he hit the side of the next passenger bucket that made him spin in the air on his way down, then spin on the ground's sleek grass when he landed.

His misery doesn't go unshared, however, because after the boys took another whiff of the turtle vomit in their passenger bucket, they throw up simultaneously. Thus, they each lost the bet, and grossed out spectators in other passenger buckets and a few on the ground who were hit by the boys' puke.

By the time the ride slowed down upon ending its running cycle, the Verne-chasing crowd has surrounded the mindwinder and just needed to wait until the ride fully stopped to catch the turtle. As Verne stood up he wobbled around in complete disorientation. Only one thought of Verne's made its way through the mind-numbing dizziness.

 **Verne thinking:** "They should have named that ride 'The Vomiter.' "

* * *

There were four sides to the 50 foot climbing wall, each one under the supervision of a different person who strapped patrons into the harness and lowered said persons down when they were done.

 **Female climbing wall supervisor:** "Step right up. Who will be the next daring girl or boy to climb up the wall?"

Two Trail Gal girls who had started rumors of a rabid squirrel in the suburbs last year approached the supervisor. The larger one with a ponytail was named Shelby, but she let the thinner one named Mackenzie speak first.

 **Mackenzie:** "My friend, Shelby, and I want to race each other to the top."

 **Female climbing wall supervisor:** "Is that so?" (Pauses to look and then confirm that the adjacent wall was also ready for the next climber) "Then let me get you strapped in and wait for my signal."

Mackenzie looked at her friend with a smile, who also smiled back.

 **Shelby (excited about the pending friendly competition):** "You're going down, Mackenzie."

 **Mackenzie (ditto):** "You first, Shelby."

The two were in their safety harnesses in no time and then got a grip of the first pegs they would use to hoist up.

 **Female climbing wall supervisor:** "Alright. On your mark. Get set—"

WHOOSH! A blast of hurricane-proportion wind hit all three people so hard that they had to shut their burning eyes that dried up fast. Mackenzie felt something lightweight touch the top of her head only for it to leave as quickly as it arrived.

Her eyes are still closed when she heard a man's voice say, "There he goes!" His eyes were so fixated on Hammy as the squirrel leaped onto Mackenzie's head and then onto a climbing peg, that the man realized too late that he was running straight toward Mackenzie at a speed who couldn't slow himself down in time. Mackenzie suddenly felt like she was tackled by a pro football player as she hit the wall hard, uninjured but shaken up nonetheless.

The man quickly helped Mackenzie onto her feet while asking, "Ohmygod! Sorry about that, young lady. A-are you alright?"

 **Female climbing wall supervisor (accusingly):** "Excuse me, sir, but what would cause you to be in such a rush that you would run into this girl?"

 **Man:** "Didn't you hear? There are wild animals running around this place and we're trying to catch them."

 **Shelby:** "Are telling me they're this far out? We're, like, 50 yards from the stage where they were spotted."

 **Female climbing wall supervisor:** "Yeah, I thought it would be safe for my colleagues and I to keep business going."

 **Man (facing Shelby):** "Not all of them got this far. Only  that one."

Shelby and the older woman followed the man's pointing finger and see Hammy going up the climbing wall's pegs. This causes the two to join the rest of the Hammy-chasing mob at throwing things in an attempt to get the squirrel to fall down. It almost worked when Hammy got hit by a souvenir ball on his back, and only prevented himself from falling by one paw. To avoid the same thing from happening again, Hammy climbed over to the right and started scaling the wall on the side adjacent to the one he began on. There was a 12 year old girl already on that part who reached out for Hammy, but her hand was batted away by an unopened soda can that someone on the ground threw while aiming for Hammy. Seeing her shake her hand and cringe her face as if it hurt, Hammy's reaction was a reflex borne of his happy-go-lucky attitude.

 **Hammy:** "Aw, you look like you need a hug."

Hammy climbed on the girl to wrap his little arms around her which caused her to freak out, then let go of the pegs her hands were on in order shove Hammy off of her, and finally to fall down. The harness and cord she was wearing slowed her descent and Hammy landed in a seated position on a peg. The squirrel remained seated for a few moments, distraught at how his hug made things worse and trying to understand how that was possible.

 **Hammy:** "I thought hugs could fix anything…"

He didn't have much longer to ponder such a personal paradox, because a half empty or half full water bottle hit his tail, and he found himself moving over and up again. With no other people climbing on any of the four sides of the wall to get in his way, Hammy easily scaled to the very top. Once there his attention became captivated by the breathtaking view of the El Rancho Camelot Estates—the thought of using the 50 foot climbing wall to locate the hedge completely leaving his mind.

 **Hammy:** "Whoooooooooaaaaa. Everything is so small, so wide, so…Whoa…It's like I can see the whole world from here!"

Then the realization hit him that he has climbed the highest he's ever climbed in his whole life—perhaps the highest any squirrel has ever climbed before—which warranted a victory dance along with some hops and fist pumps for joy. And since he was the only one at the party to his knowledge that reached the top, he decided he had a divine right that had to be addressed immediately.

 **Hammy:** "As the first one to climb to the top, I call dibs on this mountain which I name thee: Ham-Peak! Heh-heh, I used to think climbing trees taller than Steve the Hedge was an outstanding feat, but my actions today have set a new standard for—"

Suddenly, Hammy's brain started working the way it should have all along. He had been so amazed with his accomplishment that he forgot to look for the hedge. With his attention refocused with a purpose, he searched the suburbs and found the hedge. There were a lot of people blocking it, but thanks to its endless length, Hammy could easily enter it and then work his way back to the wooded area that was his home. His eyes traced in his mind the path he would have to take to get there. But before he climbed down, he noticed that none of the other family members had made it to the patch of woods behind the hedge, making him worry about them.

Confident that no human will be able to climb all the way to the top, Hammy decided to take the time to find where the rest of the family was.

* * *

Unfortunately, Hammy didn't have as much time as he believed because as soon as the squirrel had resumed his climb from his seated position, a woman on the ground with a walkie-talkie of Dwayne's pressed the button to call the man.

 **Woman with walkie-talkie:** "Mr. Verminator? The squirrel is going up the climbing wall and keeps dodging the things we throw at him. He'll reach the top in no time at this rate. Whadda we do?"

 **Dwayne's voice:** "Are there any trees or tents nearby that he can jump down to? Or any powerlines he can run across?"

After looking around the woman responded, "No sir."

 **Dwayne's voice:** "Then have as many people climb as possible. Make sure the first ones can reach the top, but the others will wait on the pegs. That way he won't be able to get down except through one of you."

 **Woman with walkie-talkie:** "Yes sir!"

She got everyone's attention by making a loud whistle with her thumb and index finger in her mouth, and repeated Dwayne's instructions. After she's done explaining the residents are impressed with the Verminator's ideas once again. He may not be much of a sociable person, but he sure knows how to do his job well.

They figured out who among them were the best climbers, put those individuals into harnesses, and then started climbing.

* * *

From atop his high perch, Hammy located RJ over at the inflatable slides, Stella at the dunking booth with Dwayne going toward her, Verne at the mindwinder, Ozzie and Heather at the spider climb & slide with Tiger approaching them, and the porcupine family at the reckless ride machine. His eyes locked onto the latter when they got knocked out, causing him to feel intense worry for Lou, Penny, and especially their kids. Verne wasn't faring much better, what with his sloppy movements wrought from a dizzying ride on the mindwinder. A person picked up the turtle who could only curl into his shell in defense, not that it would do anything to save him. It was too late to do anything for the porcupines, especially since they were unconscious, but the other family members were doing well at avoiding capture for the time being, so Hammy decided to try and save Verne.

He gets on all fours to get ready to climb down face-first, when an 18 year old boy's hand slaps on top of the ledge in front of Hammy. The guy pulled himself up, looked at Hammy and said, "Got'cha!"

Hammy turned around intending to climb down the side of the climbing wall opposite to the teenager, when a 25 year old woman's hand comes up from that ledge! She kept quiet while hoisting herself up to the top, but Hammy saw the determined look in her eyes…like the eyes of a predator that decided the thing it was looking at would be its meal.

Willing to risk the emergence of a third person, Hammy scurried to his left as he planned to gradually leap his way down one climbing peg at a time. However, he quickly realized the hard way that there were too many humans on the mountain climb for him not to get caught…even with his speed.

* * *

By the time Gladys and her close friends returned to the stage carrying Dwayne's gizmos, the party area was in chaos. People were running here and there trying to catch the animals, running into tables spilling contents in the air and on the ground. Even running into each other, but no one was able to catch the varmints.

 **Gladys:** "We need to find Dwayne so we can use the things we brought from his van. Look for him!"

After a few seconds of searching for the orange jumpsuit that one of Gladys's friends had originally told Dwayne was so out of style, the friend said, "There he is! In the direction of the dunking booth!"

The others turned to see Dwayne and a small group of people following close behind him pursuing the skunk.

 **Gladys (cocks the net gun she is carrying after locating the shotgun-like pump):** "Let's make these animals regret the clean-up bill that we'll have to pay when this is all over!"

She and her group ran in Dwayne's direction, but all stopped when they hear several nearby people scream that they were on fire. Gladys's first instinct was to go help them out, but she quickly decided against it because everyone needed Dwayne to restore order with his Verm-Tech equipment.

 **Gladys:** "Keep going! There's more than enough people to help put the flames out!"

As she and her group continued to run for Dwayne, Gladys spotted someone she never thought she would see again: her pet Persian cat.

 **Gladys:** "Apollo?!"

The mention of his owner-given name caused Tiger to turn his head and mirror his former owner's baffled stare. Gladys had thought Apollo had been adopted by another resident of the suburbs, or had been sent to the Humane Society to be given a new owner. She was so astounded at the sight of her pet that at first she doesn't notice him carrying a burning marshmallow on a roasting fork in his mouth. When her eyes are drawn to that, her mind correctly identified him as the culprit that started the fire. Why her beloved pet would do that was beyond her comprehension, until she heard a loud chittering noise near the dunking booth—the skunk—and her cat ran over to that direction.

After narrowly escaping Dwayne thanks to Tiger's help, Stella had tried to hide from her chasers under a food table. She was successful for a few minutes, but then a random person had accidentally stumbled upon her and kicked her on reflex, causing Stella to scream. Because the person was a former college football field goal kicker, Stella had flown through the air and landed on the plank at the dunking booth.

The skunk was still recovering from the kick when Dwayne spotted her, but the man suddenly found himself too tired to go after her. Dwayne wasn't used to running, as his weight clearly indicated, and the amount of running he had expended in trying to catch Stella had exhausted him. A 26 year old young woman who was part of his group walked beside him and spoke in concern.

 **26 year old woman:** "You can't be too tired now, can you?"

 **Dwayne:** "You better *pant* believe it…"

 **26 year old woman:** "What do we do?"

Dwayne glanced up to see the skunk on the dunking booth plank before he responded.

 **Dwayne:** "Dunk her in the water."

The woman nodded, shared the information with the others in her group, and then they went on while Dwayne stayed behind to catch his breath. They think of simply running to the bullseye and pressing it, but then remembered the kind of animal they would be approaching. The small crowd looked at each other nervously, no one wanting to risk getting skunked, and decided to try to dunk Stella the old fashion way.

There were three baseballs behind the throwing line, and since no one wanted to risk the skunk getting away, the first three people who got to the balls were the ones who threw them, and none of them had good throwing arms. As Dwayne looked on, he shook his head side to side in embarrassment.

 **Dwayne:** "Aw, come one. Are you kidding me?!"

He would have risked getting hit with skunk spray in order to catch the mustelid rather than play it safe. But then again, he was the only person who was willing to get skunked if he had to. Even so, his disdain increased when all three people missed the bullseye, causing him to cut his breather short and walk slowly to the dunking booth. He paused to groan at the others and then walked up to the bullseye.

Although he was obviously frustrated with their inaction, the people in his group actually found it awe-inspiring at how Dwayne was sweaty and clearly worn-out, but was still dedicated to ending the vermin's disruption. By the time Stella came to, it was too late for her to get out of the way. She expected to fall into the water, the level of which would be too low inside the tank for her to climb out, and the sides would be too smooth for her to get out. She knew how to swim, but this would be her demise.

What Stella didn't expect, and what actually happened, was for Tiger to jump onto the dunking plank and push her off it just as Dwayne hit the bullseye with his hand. She landed on the ground and Tiger landed in the water. There was nothing the feline hated more than getting drenched, but he would risk anything, go through anything, and do anything for his lover.

 **Dwayne (infuriated):** "WwwwhhhhaaaaaaaAAAAAAAT?!"

Gladys couldn't believe what her beloved Apollo just did either, but doesn't let herself get distracted this time. She yelled "Dwayne! Catch!" as she threw his net gun to him. The weapon seemed to rejuvenate Dwayne as soon as it landed in his hands. It drove the exhaustion out of his muscles and gave him laser-focus on the task at hand. He saw Stella running toward the trackless train ride and called out to her in challenge.

 **Dwayne:** "Now I'll show you who's boss!"

While he and his group gave chase, Gladys approached the dunking booth's water tank and sent Apollo a surprised look for joining the hedgies she had hated—his actions of starting the fire and getting the skunk out of harm's way proved that. But she eased up anyway because if he was comfortable with whatever he was doing, then it's no big deal to her. All that mattered was to stop the chaos that the wild animals have created. She helped him out of the water tank, told a nearby neckless vendor to fashion a makeshift leash to tie the cat to the table—that way he wouldn't cause any more trouble—and went to go join Dwayne.

Stella didn't have time to look back at Tiger after he saved her, she simply ran. She also knew that her lover wouldn't be able to bail her out of trouble again while he was trapped in the water tank. To make matters worse for her, a person whose legs she ran under got tangled in a net and falls to the ground, indicating that the Verminator had his net gun now. Therefore, she needed to get back to the hedge pronto.

She zigged and zagged from one spot to another to give Dwayne a hard time aiming for her. The plan worked, but her erratic running coupled with the ducking, diving, and dodging nearby objects and people wore her out. She was panting and sweating like a pig by the time she realized there was still quite the distance to travel in order to get back home. Fortunately, she overheard the conductor of the trackless train ride say, "All board to the Wilson residents house!"

The Wilson's were Gladys's next door neighbors, meaning the train would take Stella right to the hedge.

 **Stella:** "Finally, a break!"

The train had five cars in total: the driver and fake coal car were colored black, the car behind those was green, the one after that was blue, and the last one was red. Stella climbed on top of the driver car, stayed still, and used her black fur to blend in. Since the train was meant to transport small children, the ride was slow but thankfully uneventful. Stella saw the Wilson's mailbox getting closer three minutes later, and boy was it a sight for sore eyes. She suddenly remembered about the group of people Dwayne had told to guard the hedge and stood up to try to see them.

A big mistake.

One of the child passengers saw Stella and yelled, "SKUNK!" The train driver panicked just as much and floored the gas pedal. Stella nearly lost her balance but managed to keep herself from falling. Judging the train's speed to be fast enough for a daring feat, she backed up to give herself some running distance, ran, jumped, and landed on the green passenger car like a scene from a cowboy/western movie. She did the same to land on the blue car and then the red caboose. She found a spot of grass that would be soft to land on and then jumped one more time—

—Only to get caught in midair by a net that Dwayne had fired at her like a true marksman. The net gun's nets were already designed to coil around vermin, but Stella got even more tangled when she landed on the ground in a roll.

Though Dwayne had lost track of the skunk visually, Dwayne's Verm-Tech training enabled him to easily sniff out Stella's location. All he had to do was keep his distance and wait. Now that Stella was in a net, Dwayne quickly approached her and picked her up, smiling while doing so, and said "Who's da man? I am!"

Before Stella could use her skunk spray to escape, Dwayne seemed to read her mind. He said, "Oh no you don't!" while grabbing her tail in one quick motion and held it tightly near her rear which made her unable to effectively use her stink. All the people around Dwayne cheered and clapped for him, making him bow. But as soon as his back was straight again, he got a call from one of the people on his walkie-talkies.

 **Person's voice:** "Mr. Verminator Guy? We've captured all the animals expect for the raccoon, possums, and skunk. What should we do now?"

Knowing that Dwayne needed both hands to hold onto the skunk, one of the spectators walked up to him, grabbed his walkie-talkie, and hold it up to him.

 **Dwayne:** "I've just nabbed the skunk, so that leaves three animals unaccounted for. But go ahead and go to my van and get 11 cages. I'll meet you over there and then we'll go search for the other three."

 **Person's voice:** "10-4."

When Dwayne looked to address the crowd, he discovered to his pleasure that they were eagerly waiting for his next instruction. For the first time in his life Dwayne finally felt like a big shot. The feeling was intoxicating, but he doesn't get lost in it for too long. He still had a job to do.

 **Dwayne:** "Well what're we waiting for? Go find the raccoon and opossums. We're getting them  all."

 **Crowd:** "Yes sir!"

They all dispersed to carry out their task, not wanting to let the Verminator down in the slightest.

* * *

Ozzie and Heather were still pretending to be stuffed animals at the ring toss booth as they planned to wait for the party to end. When that happened, they would slip away during the clean-up when the only people around would be workers and not partiers. Both were concerned about how the rest of the family was doing, but couldn't risk checking things out themselves. Then their worst fears were confirmed by the conversation that was approaching the ring toss booth. It was between a mother holding her seven year old daughter's hand and the man in charge of the ring toss booth.

 **Mother:** "Is that so?"

 **Ring toss owner:** "Yep. All the animals have been captured except the raccoon and possums."

As the man kept talking, Ozzie's brow furrowed and Heather gasped.

 **Ozzie:** "Shh!"

Heather went silent immediately and did her best to try to remain calm, lest she blows her own and her dad's cover.

 **Ring toss owner: (While looking at the seven year old girl with a business-man smile):** "Which means it's safe enough to reopen my ring toss booth…and there's no line!"

 **Seven year old girl:** "Oh! Mommy, mommy! I wanna try the ring toss!"

 **Mother:** "Alright, sweetie."

The owner walked into the booth and picked up 10 rings that he keeps in

 **Ring toss owner:** "As you can see, the pegs all have points labeled above them in which the harder the shot, the more points you earn. The minimum point is five and the maximum is 50. Since you're a little young, you need to score 50 or higher to win a prize. Any questions?"

 **Seven year old girl:** "Let's do it!"

 **Ring toss owner:** "Alllll-riiiiiight!"

Thinking that it would be easy, and letting her excitement get the better of her, the girl threw her first three shots without aiming and missed them all.

 **Mother:** "Slow down, Cassie. Aim and then throw."

 **Cassie:** Ok, mommy."

Cassie's shots were more accurate after that. She only missed one, and ended with a total score of 45 points.

 **Cassie:** "Awwwww. Five points short…"

Ozzie and Heather couldn't have been more thankful, and let out one of the biggest internal sighs of relief in their lives. They had been very nervous about the girl winning and picking one of them as a prize. But they can remain safe for now.

 **Ring toss owner:** "Tell you what, since many people might have left the party early when things went all wacko, and I have a lot of prizes to hand out, how about I round up your score to 50 and let you pick a prize?"

When Ozzie and Heather's fear returned in full-force, they almost play possum as opossums should: as a defense mechanism, and not a dramatic performance as Ozzie often did.

 **Cassie:** "Yes, yes! Please Mr.!"

 **Mother (to the ring toss owner):** "That's very nice of you."

 **Ring toss owner (with a twinkle in his eye):** "But you must promise me not to tell anyone else that I let you do this, okay? It'll be our little secret."

 **Cassie:** "I promise!"

As the ring toss owner walked over to the prize shelf, the opossums silently cursed the man's generosity and wished that he could have played by the rules he clearly set.

 **Ring toss owner:** "So which stuffed animal do you want?"

Cassie looked at the collection of plushes and tried to find an animal she didn't own. She already had a pony, puppy dog, teddy bear, and bunny but didn't have a cat, duckling, Popple, unicorn, or penguin. She wasn't interested in the snake, shark, lizard, dragon, lion, kangaroo, or piglet. Then her eyes found what she wanted.

 **Cassie:** "I'll take the white mouse. It's the only one that looks like Mickey and Minnie Mouse."

It took all of Ozzie and Heather's strength and willpower not to faint after hearing that.

 **Ring toss owner:** "Actually that's an opossum and they're the only marsupial found in North America. Like a kangaroo, their babies are born and carried in pouches. But anyway, here you go."

As the ring toss owner picked up Heather, he mused, "Strange…I don't remember bring in any possum plushes. And whoever made this stuffed possum knew what they were doing because it feels so real…"

Ozzie, however, was unable to keep himself in check any more. Losing the other family members was bad enough, but he couldn't, and wouldn't, let his beloved daughter be taken from him. He jumped forward onto the ring toss owner's chest, hissing while doing so, and bit the man in the arm that was holding Heather. The man yelled in pain and let go of Heather who went to the ground outside of the booth. Through the resulting screaming and yelling of all three humans, Ozzie was able to tell Heather what might be his last fatherly instruction.

 **Ozzie:** "RUN!"

 **Heather:** "Not without you!"

 **Ozzie:** "JUST GO!  NOW!"

Heather ran for all that she was worth as the ring toss owner tried to get Ozzie off of him. But Ozzie wouldn't give up and was prepared to fight like he's never fought before to buy Heather as much time as he could.

Lucky for the ring toss owner, but unlucky for Ozzie, Wyatt arrived after hearing the commotion at the ring toss booth and reached over to grab Ozzie by the tail and the back of the neck. The unexpectedness of the animal rights advocate's actions made Ozzie reflexively ease his grip on the ring toss owner, and by the time he tried to renew his struggle, he was unable to turn around and attack Wyatt.

 **Wyatt:** "Easy…Easy there, big fella. I'm not gonna hurt you or your friends. My colleagues and I are gonna make sure you won't get exterminated."

The man's words made Ozzie relax for his own welfare, and for Heather's safety when Michael ran over and caught her. Still, he'd prefer the whole family to have freedom on their own terms instead of any humans'. With one shred of hope left in his otherwise broken spirits, he whispered a prayer out loud.

 **Ozzie:** "RJ, if you're out there somewhere, we could really use your help right about now."

* * *

As RJ neared the yards that would take him back to the wooded area behind the hedge, he reflected upon his wise decision of choosing the inflatable slides to lose the humans that were after him. Those attractions were on the border of the party grounds and the part of the El Rancho Camelot Estate outside the party grounds. Without as many people in the streets of the latter section, RJ was able to hide behind whatever house, fence, yard plant, etc. he came across. His pursuers had been searching for him in the wrong direction five minutes after entering the normal streets, and would probably continue doing so by the time RJ was home.

The only downside of going through the streets outside of the party area was that it took RJ longer to return to the hedge, but now he was nearly there. He was in the front yard of a house whose back yard would let him enter the hedge about 50 yards away from the area with the log. He would stay inside the hedge and work his way back.

However, his proximity to the hedge did little to ease his nerves. He can't detect the scent of any other family members, which pointed to only one answer: they had been caught. RJ would think of a way to save them like he did a year ago as soon as his mind settled after he got back home…A task that seemed impossible after he saw what was ahead of him.

There were countless humans lining the hedge, and they were tighter than a time capsule seal. RJ tried to find a weak spot to exploit—perhaps a small or skinny human who he could surprise and go through to reach freedom—but no such people were guarding the hedge.

 **RJ thinking:** "Well, they still haven't noticed me, so maybe I can stay here until I think of a better plan…Let's see…Maybe if I—"

 **Landon:** "There's the raccoon!"

RJ looked over his shoulder and spotted the animal rights advocate leading a group of people who were running toward him like a football skirmish line. RJ ran forward and decided to use his previously successful tactic of leaping at humans while hissing with his claws facing outward to get through the hedge.

But as he prepared to jump up, he could tell from the way how none of the people flinched at his approach that this group of humans wouldn't be as easily frightened. Nevertheless, RJ had already started to move, and leaped at the woman in front of him. Although her face showed fear, her body didn't back down. As soon as RJ landed on her shoulder, he immediately jumped back down to the ground before someone next to her could grab him.

Landon's group was closer now, and RJ was out of options. There was so much riding on him avoiding getting caught. He knew he had to get through in order to save the other hedgies who were his new beloved family. They were depending on him. But how would he get through the hedge? There were too many people guarding it and people coming from the other direction. The frenzied thoughts and stress caused RJ to temporarily lose all intelligence and to act out of animalistic instinct to try to go over them. He landed on top of the woman's head, then jumped to the next person's head, and then a third person's head, each leap getting him closer to his goal. His fingers were about to touch the hedge's green leaves when a hand from below grabbed RJ by the tail and pulled him down. RJ didn't even try to struggle because he knew it was over…It was all over.

RJ was so mentally and physically overloaded from the things that have happened today, that he passed out before his body even hit the ground.

* * *

When RJ woke up he found himself in a cage like the other animals near him, minus Tiger who was sitting next to and outside of Stella's cage. They were in front of Dwayne's van, with all the partiers gathered around the vehicle and Dwayne behind the cages. The verminator pumped his fists and smiled as the people cheered him on. When he's had enough self-indulgence for the time being, he took a microphone to his mouth and spoke.

 **Dwayne:** "Thank you, thank you. All of you are wonderful. But you know I can't take all the credit. Each and every one of you played a vital role in capturing these animals."

 **Verne (whose cage was beside RJ's):** "I can see you hoped that it was all a dream…We all did. But it's not."

 **RJ:** "Everyone…I'm so sorry. I-I tried…but—"

 **Hedgies:** "We know…"

Their comforting gaze took a huge burden off the raccoon's conscience. They knew it wasn't his fault and that he tried his very best to not get caught, just like they did. All they could do now was wait and see what happened to them.

 **Verne:** "At least we're all still a family…"

The others nodded and then continued to listen to what the humans were saying.

Dwayne's instruction and knowledge at this situation earned him a lot of respect among the locals, and Gladys planned to show the same respect toward her fellow residents when Dwayne handed her the microphone.

 **Gladys:** "Mr. LaFontant is absolutely right. I cannot be happier for the courage, quick thinking, and persistence everyone has shown today. I am indebted to all of you for saving the day! Give yourselves a round of applause!"

The humans clapped, bumped fists, high-fived, whistled, cheered, hugged; some lovers kissed, a few punk rock fans butted heads; and several threw things in the air—all in huzzah for their efforts and proud to be living in the El Rancho Camelot Estates. Gladys didn't try to cut the moment short in the slightest, and simply waited for them to calm down on their own before tapping the mike to get their attention.

 **Gladys:** "And now it's time to decide what happens to these animals."

The residents listened closely and are willing to agree with anything Dwayne and Gladys say to do with the animals.

 **Gladys:** "I believe I speak for everyone when I say we send them to Verm-Tech to be disposed."

Everyone in the audience yelled various words of affirmation.

 **Dwayne (while glaring at RJ):** "And _this_ time, no one's gonna save them with a wagon load of food."

 **Michael:** "Whoa, whoa,  whoa. Let's be reasonable here, folks. There are plenty of other options that can remove them from this neighborhood without killing them. After all, humans have to learn to share the world with all living creatures."

 **Audience:** "No!"

 **Gladys:** "I don't think the rest of us are willing to be so lenient on creatures that maliciously and deliberately attacked the party to cause mayhem, Mr. Eads."

 **Tyler:** "But don't you remember? You were leading us to go get some food and drinks when we saw them in our path and then everything went bonkers. They weren't attacking anyone, they were just looking for a bite to eat. And any time they tried to attack us afterward was out of self-defense."

 **Landon:** "You also need to cut them some slack for having only an acre of land to forage food and water from."

 **Wyatt:** "By building houses around their once-natural habitat, they have no choice but to come into the suburbs for food."

 **Ryleigh:** "Their lives are harder than any of us could ever imagine, even if they had plenty of woods to live in."

A good number of people in the audience found themselves agreeing with the advocates' claims. One in particular did not.

 **Gladys:** "Well I object because these aren't your average animals. They're cunning, observant of the human world, use stolen items to carry out their mischief, and even know how to operate machinery as they demonstrated today."

 **Michael:** "Which only reinforces the need not to kill them. I mean, observing the human world? The ability to use human items? And knowing how to operate machinery…? Don't you think that's amazing? They're scientific miracles, you can't just kill them."

 **Gladys:** "They're a menace to our peaceful way of life and must be eliminated. Not only for what they did today, but also because of the same incident that happened last year. They ruined that Welcome to the Neighborhood Party by stealing all of the food that I ordered and destroying my house. They just heist every time they see food, and because they tried doing the same today, it shows that they'll keep wanting to do it in the future."

 **Tyler:** "Hold on! I've got an idea that might be crazy enough to work. You said they heist everything they see, right? And we said that such behavior developed in the first place because of their small habitat that forces them to seek alternative sources of food. Why not try to change that behavior?"

Gladys, remembering the importance of being flexible and how good that was for her image, decided to at least consider the new proposition.

 **Gladys:** "How?"

 **Tyler:** "Because these animals are so used to eating human food instead of their species' natural diet, why not give them the food they tried to steal today and let them return to their home? By showing you're willing to help them out, it just might make them give up their intrusion into the suburbs for a while. That will buy my colleagues and I with more than enough time to come up with a plan to relocate them. And by giving them a large amount of food this once, instead of on a regular basis, it won't make them become dependent on humans to provide them food so that they'll be ready to adapt back into their natural habitat upon relocation."

 **Dwayne:** "You want to actually reward them for all the trouble they've caused? Are you out of your mind?"

 **Gladys (to Dwayne):** "Actually, it wouldn't hurt to give it a try."

Dwayne looked at Gladys in disbelief, until he saw her mouth the word "flexibility" to him. He nodded and let her continue speaking, wanting to give flexibility a try himself.

 **Gladys (to Tyler):** "If it means they'll be relocated and never cause harm to El Rancho Camelot ever again, I'm willing to leave it into your hands." (To everyone in the crowd) "So, according to what we had learned today, is it fair to give them what they need?"

There were murmurs at first, then the murmurs increased in volume until it seemed like each individual person could be heard at once. And no matter what words were said, all indicated that they agreed with Gladys…again and perhaps forever after today.

With that, the people releashed the forst family from the cages and shared half the food to the hedgies. The generosity surprised the animals in the process, but made them happy to get the food they had tried so hard to obtain.

 **RJ:** "Whoa, I wasn't expecting that. I can't believe how easy that was."

 **Verne:** "Yeah. I thought the whole thing with the excessive traps and Depelter Turbo was going to start all over again."

 **Tiger:** "It's a good thing they've learned their lesson. And now all of you know what it's like to be provided food from humans willingly. Pretty good, no?"

The "Mms" from the hedgies as they ate was as close to a "yes" as they were going to say.

 **Lou:** "And I think we should fully go along with the relocation."

 **Penny:** "It's not so bad when you think about the alternative of staying cooped up in one acre of forest for the rest of our lives."

 **Ozzie:** "Yeah. Come think of it, maybe there could be a bigger forest than this."

 **Stella:** "And there's probably a lot more food over there than here."

The nods that followed gave unanimous testimony of the animals agreeing with the idea of the relocation. A better life awaited them after all.

* * *

The rest of the day went by well for humans and animals alike, and the Welcome to the Neighborhood Party was a tremendous success. Once it was time to start packing up the attractions and vendor stations, Dwayne was able to speak with Gladys in private again.

 **Dwayne:** "I gotta tell you, I'm really impressed with how you handled the situation with the advocates before the animals showed up."

 **Gladys (smiling):** "Thank you. It wasn't easy to hold back my temper. But I really appreciate you for keeping things from exploding out of control."

 **Dwayne:** "No problem. And you should come over to my apartment for dinner some time this week."

 **Gladys:** "Okay, I will."

With that, Gladys went back into her house and had one of the most satisfying night's sleep of her life. Her actions at the party and dealing with the animals was one of the greatest obstacles she had overcome. Now that it was behind her, she never had to worry about facing any other big issues in the future.

Or so she thought.

* * *

The next day, Gladys was working at her office when the phone on her desk rang. She picked it up after the first ring.

 **Gladys:** "Hi, this is Gladys Sharp, the President of the Homeowners Association: Indiana Branch."

 **Landon:** "Hello Ms. Sharp, this is Landon Ford. I'm one of the Wildlife Protection and Humane Treatment Association advocates that started the commotion yesterday at the party you were throwing… you know, trying to ruin your reputation…"

The man spoke nervously on the other line of the phone.

 **Gladys:** "Oh, hi, Mr. Landon. Yes, I remember that."

Landon continued with caution behind every word.

 **Landon:** "If you still hate me, I understand."

 **Gladys:** "No worries, I said to you and your associates yesterday that there would be no hard feelings; water under the bridge and all. But I would like to know what makes you bring the topic up?"

 **Landon:** "Well, we weren't doing it just to argue for our cause and against yours..."

Gladys shifted from a reclined position to an upright one in her chair, giving him her full attention.

 **Gladys:** "Go on..."

 **Landon (sighing):** "The other four advocates and I were ordered to cause trouble at yesterday's event because we wanted to get you fired so that a new Homeowner's Association president with better ideas than yours could take your place."

Gladys gasps, she never expected anyone from within the Homeowners Association stooping that low in an effort to get a promotion, at her expense no less.

Before she can voice her vexed opinion, Landon quickly added, "But since you had altered your rules recently, and didn't bring up any charges against me and my colleagues—even when you should have—we decided to stop trying to get you fired."

 **Gladys (smiles):** "Well, I'm glad to hear that. Thanks for letting me know.

 **Landon:** "No problem, ma'am."

 **Gladys:** "But who is the person you and your friends were working for?"

 **Landon:** "I wish I could tell you, Ms. Sharp, I really want to. But if I do, then this person will know it was one of us who gave her away to you, and get us fired. We're the only ones who are overtly working for her at this point, so the process of elimination will be too easy."

 **Gladys:** "'Overtly?' So there are others this mystery person has under her thumb?"

 **Landon:** "That is correct, Ms. Sharp, but I can't say who they are either or else it's bad news for me and my friends. All I can say is that you need to proceed cautiously when you investigate into this. This person holds a lot of influence."

Gladys wanted to know more, to get a positive ID on whoever is trying to oust her, but decided that Landon is already taking a big risk telling her what he has. So she doesn't want to make things worse for Landon and his other colleagues.

 **Gladys:** "I will. Thanks again."

 **Landon:** "You're welcome."

And with that, they hung up with the satisfied look on their faces. Gladys had a lot of work to do.

* * *

 **Wow, quite a chapter! Hope you liked it!**


End file.
